South African film music Representation of racial, cultural and national identities, 1931-1969
Christopher Jeffery
Town
Thesis presented in partial fulfilment of the requirements forCape the degree of DOCTOR OF MUSICof (COMPOSITION) in the South African College of Music UNIVERSITY OF CAPE TOWN October 2017 University
Supervisors: Assoc. Prof. Morné Bezuidenhout Assoc. Prof. Adam Haupt The copyright of this thesis vests in the author. No quotation from it or information derived from it is to be published without full acknowledgement of the source. The thesis is to be used for private study or non- commercial research purposes only.
Published by the University of Cape Town (UCT) in terms of the non-exclusive license granted to UCT by the author.
University of Cape Town Plagiarism Declaration
“This thesis/dissertation has been submitted to the Turnitin module (or equivalent similarity and originality checking software) and I confirm that my supervisor has seen my report and any concerns revealed by such have been resolved with my supervisor.”
Name: Christopher Jeffery
Student number: JFFCHR002
Signature: Signature Removed
Date: 28 February 2017 i
Contents
Abstract ...... vi
Acknowledgements ...... vii
Introduction ...... 1
Background and rationale ...... 1
The problem of literature on South African film music ...... 7
Research question and objectives ...... 10
Research question ...... 10
Research objectives ...... 10
Research design ...... 11
Sample design ...... 11
Research methodology ...... 11
Sampling methods ...... 12
Analysis of primary source material ...... 13
Interpretation of primary source material ...... 14
Outline of chapters ...... 15
Chapter 1 Literature Review and Theoretical Framework ...... 17
South African film and music studies ...... 18
Film music ...... 18
Film ...... 25
Music...... 32
Theoretical relevance of film and music studies...... 34 ii
National film music studies ...... 34
Britain ...... 37
Continental Europe ...... 41
Australia ...... 43
Bollywood ...... 44
The Soviet Union ...... 47
Theoretical relevance of national film music studies ...... 47
Mainstream film music studies ...... 48
Theory of film music ...... 51
Analysis of film music ...... 60
History of film music ...... 66
Theoretical relevance of mainstream film music studies ...... 67
Chapter 2 From Silents to Sound Film ...... 68
The silent era ...... 69
The beginning of sound: mainstream contexts ...... 72
South African early sound films ...... 73
Sarie Marais (1931) ...... 74
Moedertjie (1931) ...... 74
Building a Nation (1938) ...... 77
Concluding remarks ...... 81
Chapter 3 Rural African Music in South African Film ...... 83
The rural environment ...... 84
The 1930s to 1940s ...... 86
Rhodes of Africa (1936) ...... 86 iii
King Solomon’s Mines (1937)...... 89
Building a Nation (1938) ...... 95
Simon Beyers (1947) ...... 102
Trends in the use of African music in the 1930s and 1940s ...... 105
The 1950s to 1960s ...... 106
Dingaka (1964) ...... 107
The Naked Prey (1966) ...... 113
The Jackals (1967) ...... 116
Trends in the use of African music in the 1950s and 1960s ...... 119
Chapter 4 Urban African Music in South African Film ...... 121
The urban environment ...... 121
African Jim (1949) ...... 123
Come Back, Africa (1959) ...... 126
Dilemma (1962) ...... 138
Concluding remarks ...... 146
Chapter 5 Afrikaner Nationalism and Film Music ...... 148
Afrikaner nationalist vs African-oriented films ...... 149
Nationalist strategies in Afrikaans cinema ...... 152
Manifesto nationalism: pioneers ...... 155
Simon Beyers (1947) ...... 155
Mythologized nationalism: films of the South African Wars ...... 158
Myth creation and heroism ...... 160
National anthems and icons ...... 166
Pathos and kitsch...... 170 iv
Bourgeois nationalism: social intrigue...... 172
Geboortegrond (1946) ...... 172
Pinkie se Erfenis (1946) ...... 176
Debbie (1965) ...... 179
Geheim van Nantes (1969) ...... 184
Concluding remarks ...... 189
Conclusion ...... 193
Research question ...... 193
Motivation ...... 193
Findings...... 197
Implications of the study ...... 203
Theoretical implications ...... 203
Policy implications ...... 205
Relationship to the field ...... 206
Limitations of the study ...... 206
Suggestions for further research ...... 207
Concluding remarks ...... 208
Sources Referenced ...... 209
Written sources ...... 209
Sound recordings ...... 232
Films ...... 234
Appendix A South African Feature Film Composers, 1931-1969 ...... 240
Appendix B Feature Films by Genre with Composers, 1931-1969 ...... 246 v
Appendix C Feature Films by Date with Composers, 1931-1969 ...... 254
Appendix D South African Film Industry Event Timeline, 1913-1969 ...... 262
vi
Abstract
The thesis examines the role of music in South African film pertaining to representation of identity of South African peoples and cultures, from the country’s earliest sound films until the industry expansion of the 1970s. Chapter 1 contextualizes the study in relation to South African film and music, mainstream (Hollywood) film music theory/analysis/history, and national film music studies outside the Hollywood context. Chapter 2 provides an analysis of nationalist trends in South African silent film and the transition to sound film. The subsequent two chapters analyse the filmic use of rural and urban African music as tools of representation of African identity across a continuum of films, from earlier colonial/Afrikaner nationalist-oriented films to later films with an explicitly anti-apartheid message. The final chapter returns to the themes of Chapter 2, exploring film-musical representation of Afrikaner nationalism. As with Chapters 3 and 4, the source material is eclectic, covering a broad spectrum of techniques to promote a nationalist agenda.
The study reaches four principal findings. Firstly, film-musical representation of African identity develops nuance over time, as African subjects succeed in moving from being represented to achieving some self-representation. This representation remains within the ambit of diegetic music, however, and frequently maintains a subject/object relationship regarding white/black representation. Secondly, the use of diegetic African music functions as a form of othering, creating an illusion of representational “authenticity” while in practice ensuring the music remains external to the filmmakers’ expressive universe, relegating it to the role of “ethnic” colour rather than engagement with characters’ psychologies. Thirdly, film music is implicated in issues of land rights: rural African music questions the legitimacy of “whites only” city spaces, and is metaphorical of population displacement from rural to urban locales. Conversely, nationalist films use pastoral tropes to reimagine rural African spaces through European conceptualizations of “tamed” land, and sentimentalize spaces through song to lay claim to them through emotional ties. Fourthly, it evaluates African music’s potential to function as dramatic, narrative, extra- diegetic underscore, showing how this was partly achieved by certain films of the period, with possible implications for contemporary mainstream film scoring. vii Acknowledgements
Thanks firstly to my principal supervisor, Assoc. Prof. Morné Bezuidenhout, for his input and patience over the years. Thanks likewise go to my thesis co-supervisor, Assoc. Prof. Adam Haupt, for his insightful commentary. My composition supervisor, Dr Martin Watt, deserves equal thanks for his positive guidance and attention to detail during the creation of my accompanying composition portfolio.
Various funders have provided generous support over the course of this project. I wish to thank the University of Cape Town for support from the Harry Crossley Foundation Postgraduate Scholarship, The Doctoral Research Scholarship and the University Research Scholarship. Thank you also to the South African College of Music for providing support from their postgraduate scholarship fund. Thanks are also due to SAMRO for an Educational Grant. My employer, the University of South Africa, contributed substantially to my fees through their employee Study Assistance fund, for which I am very grateful. Thank you as well to the Unisa Master’s and Doctoral Support Fund.
My family likewise deserve much praise. Thanks to my mother and father, for their never- ending support over many years. And thanks especially to my partner Akhona and our daughter Jean, for allowing me the time to work on this project and for good times generally. 1
Introduction
Background and rationale It was still possible for a book in 1977, and even in a 1992 2nd edition, to be titled Film music: a neglected art (Prendergast 1977 and 1992). In it the author says of film music, “[s]eldom in the annals of music history has a new form of musical expression gone so unnoticed” (1977: vii; 1992: ix). Although Marks (1979: 289), quoted in Wierzbicki (2012: xi), has qualified Prendergast’s statement, pointing out that there were in fact many sources but they are “far from easy to come by…. Books on film music pass speedily out of print, while articles lie scattered and buried in ephemeral or out-of-reach journals”, a lack of readily available sources nevertheless characterized the field at this point. Today, however, there is an extensive and continually increasing amount of material following a wide cross- section of approaches to mainstream, “Hollywood style” film music.1 In addition to this material, regional studies of film music have been carried out in various countries, such as Britain, Brazil, Australia and Russia. As yet, however, although the first South African feature film, The Great Kimberley Diamond Robbery, dates back to 1910, almost no research has been conducted on the topic of South African film music.2 As Chapter 1 will demonstrate, South African film has received increasing attention in recent years, with a particular focus on the relationship between film and apartheid, but the role that music plays in establishing this relationship has received minimal attention.
There is an increasing trend in film music studies towards awarding music equal status to the visual aspect. This trend is the central premise of Goldmark et al. (2007), for instance. This shift in the status of film music internationally towards sharing equal status with the
1 The metonym “Hollywood” occurs widely as “the code name we all use for the American film industry” (Slobin 2008: vii). 2 The first sound films appeared in the United States of America in 1927. The earliest South African sound films are Sarie Marais (1931) and Moedertjie (1931). There do not appear to be any film scores or recordings still in existence of earlier music used to accompany South African films from the silent film era, although scores were especially composed for certain well-known South African silent films such as De Voortrekkers (1916) (Gutsche 1972: 315). Chapter 2 will return to this topic. 2 visual aspects of the film is a trend that is gradually being acknowledged in the South African film industry but has yet to be generally acknowledged in South African film studies. South African film music continues to be a relevant “new form of musical expression gone… unnoticed” (Prendergast 1992: ix), though there is evidence of increasing awareness among the country’s film scholars of the importance of the soundtrack as a conveyor of meaning. Dovey and Impey (2010: 69) for instance, in their analysis of political subtexts in the performance of African music in the 1949 film African Jim (dir. Donald Swanson), recognize that
within film studies in general, and African film studies in particular, it would seem vital to acknowledge the need for more profound studies of the complex ways in which African soundscapes—African music and African languages—contribute to the multiple meanings of films that are made in this context.
It is not merely music or sound that has gone unnoticed, however, but also the composers, especially in the context of academic discourse. Appendix A lists 95 composers who were engaged in film score creation during the period of 39 years from 1931-1969, the majority of whom belong to a scarcely-documented and thus barely remembered history of artists working in a number of musical fields, predominantly popular. Appendix B and Appendix C list 162 feature films made over the same period.3 Figure 1 represents the number of films produced per year in South Africa between 1910 and 2013.4 Figure 2 extracts from Figure 1 the number of films produced per year in South Africa during the period under examination in the current study, namely 1931-1969.
3 The precise total number of South African feature films varies depending on how the term is defined. Moses’s list of South African feature films from 1910 to 2012 has 878 entries. Armes (2008) lists 1434 South African features shot between 1910 and 2007. The discrepancy is accounted for by Moses’s focus on mainstream films, omitting the majority of B-scheme, or “Blaxploitation”, productions made in the 1970s and 1980s by white filmmakers for black audiences, and also many independent films in the “Third Cinema” model, which as Tomaselli describes were made for distribution outside the mainstream cinema circuit, bypassing standard sources of capital and the censors (1988: 97-8). 4 The data from 1910 to 2006 is from Armes (2008: 232-235), while that from 2007-2013 relies on my own count based on information from the Internet Movie Database (IMDb), announcements of new films on the website filmcontact.com, and advertising sources. I do not claim to have comprehensively included every film from these later years. 3
170 160 150 140 130 120 110 100 90 80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 1910 1920 1930 1940 1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010
Figure 1: South African film production per year, 1910-2013
18
16
14
12
10
8
6
4
2
0 1931 1936 1941 1946 1951 1956 1961 1966
Figure 2: South African film production per year, 1931-1969 4
It is clear from these graphs that the difference in scale between the South African industry and Hollywood, for instance, is one of several orders of magnitude: to take an extreme example, in the year 1929-1930, Hollywood produced 1071 feature films (Wierzbicki 2009: 120), equivalent to about three-quarters of the total South African output over the period of nearly one hundred years from 1910 to 2006. During the same years of 1929- 1930, the South African industry did not produce any films.
Cross-referencing the timeline of events in Appendix D with the data in Figure 1 provides some insight into factors that affected the level of feature film production as displayed in Figure 1. The first spike in production from 1956 up to 1961 coincides with the introduction of the film subsidy in 1956. The increased production visible in the 1970s coincides with the introduction of the “B scheme” subsidy in 1973. The extreme spike beginning in 1982 and culminating in 1988 is the result of B scheme production together with the introduction of tax breaks for film production, resulting in an influx of international productions (usually of questionable quality) using South Africa as a filming location. The tax break also coincided with the announcement of the State of Emergency, causing the Rand to plummet in value, making South Africa an even cheaper filming location for foreign film companies (Tomaselli 1988).
The above information, particularly regarding Figure 1, provides the rationale for the chronological focus area of the current study, especially regarding the end date. The study begins in 1931 because this is when the first sound films were released in South Africa, and thus the date of the first available film music for study.5 From the early 1970s, the nature of the industry shifted considerably, resulting in different streams of filmmaking that has led Botha (1995) to describe the industry as “fragmented”. Given the available scope of the present study, the chosen period allows for reasonable depth of analysis without necessitating very large omissions, although as the “Suggestions for further research” section in the Conclusion makes clear, it has certainly not been possible to cover all categories of film even within this curtailed period.
5 Chapter 2, however, provides some historical contextualization through consolidation of available information on South African film music practices in the era of silent film. 5
While internal factors were an important influence on the South African industry and its output, the extent to which international trends influenced the industry, specifically regarding music, has not yet been established. Wierzbicki (2009: 133-159) documents the lively debate regarding the aesthetics of the field of film music that took place during the “golden age” of Hollywood film music from 1933-1949. The central questions under debate were the extent to which film music should be “inaudible”, namely not consciously noticed by the listener even though it was present and supporting the narrative; and the aesthetic value of film music, specifically comparing the output of “concert music” composers with that of professional film composers. While there is evidence that trends in Hollywood influenced South African film music, debates such as these appear never to have reached South African shores. South Africa produced only 22 films during this period (many of which show little regard for the nuances of the aesthetic relationship of music to film). There would therefore have been limited economic imperative to make the issue prominent; in Hollywood, by contrast, film music functions as a crucial parameter of a package aimed at maximizing commercial potential.
Appendix A, Appendix B and Appendix C present in various formats all the South African feature films released from 1931-1969,6 and the composers responsible for the music in these films.7 As far as I have been able to ascertain, the creation of this list represents the first attempt to document the individual composers involved in the history of South African film music. An exception is Blignaut and Botha (1992), whose filmography includes credits for personnel involved on films between the years the book covers, namely 1979- 1991, though this does not overlap with the period under analysis here. The user-edited IMDb typically includes composer credits for South African films for those films crediting the composer in the title sequence, and therefore represents a documentation of composers
6 As footnote 3 above explains, however, what constitutes “all” depends on the parameters used to define the concept. 7 The list of composers is not comprehensive. This is because not all the titles are available anymore—in many cases not even the South African National Film, Video and Sound Archives (SANFVSA) possesses a copy. Establishing composer credentials frequently necessitates watching the films, though in such situations this is not possible. 6 involved in South African film; although the information is available on the site, it is not accessible as a discrete list, and is not always reliable.
Only a few of these composers belong to the “canon” of South African composers, in other words those who occupy a position of status in an academic context, and whose (non-film) work has been the subject of study by musicologists. Some examples are Michael Blake (SMS Sugar Man (2008 dir. Aryan Kaganof)), Stanley Glasser (Last of the Few (1960 dir. David Millin)), Michael Hankinson (Shangani Patrol (1970 dir. David Millin), Die Banneling (1971 dir. David Millin) and Die Voortrekkers (1973 dir. David Millin)) and Jeanne Zaidel-Rudolph (An African Dream (1987 dir. John Smallcombe)). The film of Graham Newcater’s ballet Raka (1968 dir. Sven Persson) can be included here, though it is not a traditional narrative feature film. The Eighth Plague (1945), a short by director Jack Lee, credits Arnold van Wyk as the composer. The vast majority of South Africa’s film composers, however, have received no coverage from musicologists or the academic community in general. The schism between academic and commercial composers in South Africa remains wide—the film composers’ “commercial” status has resulted in their academic marginalization, as has the secondary status afforded to film music in academia until quite recently. With musicologists’ increasing acknowledgement globally of the value and necessity of a universal study of musical genre, and the acknowledgement of the importance of film music particularly, South African music studies is overdue in recognizing these composers as an integral part of the South African musical landscape. Their musical contribution to the country needs to be critically analysed and assessed.
The South African film industry is undergoing a period of rapid growth, partly due to the affordable but high-quality services on offer to foreign filmmakers, stimulating the commercials industry especially (SouthAfrica.info Reporter 2007). The expansion in infrastructure currently under way, for instance the recently completed Cape Town Film Studios, is also a part of this phenomenon. The studio began film production in 2010 (Johns 2010) and has already been involved in a number of international productions, including Dredd 3D and Safe House. The industry is also increasingly widening its influence internationally, as well as being increasingly influenced by international trends, 7 as is evident for instance in the recent signing of a co-production agreement between South Africa and Australia (Peterson 2010).
It is thus high time to take stock of South African film composers’ achievements, both for academic purposes and for those actively engaged in the creation of such music. This is justified by at least three reasons. Firstly, as the industry expands, it is important that film composers understand the historical context in which they are writing, preventing the reinvention of the wheel and allowing composers to critically build on their predecessors’ output. Secondly, the increasing internationalization of South African film results in the assimilation of techniques from these international sources. This is potentially positive, but likewise an awareness of national identity is a positive force for South African film composers interested in creating or retaining an effective regional character. Thirdly, like all the arts in South Africa, film and film music are undergoing a complete transition from apartheid-era ideology and methods of production to the current post-apartheid environment. The status quo of film music production has entirely shifted, while that which is being shifted from and to, and the nature of the shift itself, remains almost entirely undocumented. In order for film music production in South Africa to grow beyond its ad hoc status, understanding of its history and current practice is required, which in turn requires scholarly documentation of the field as a whole.
The problem of literature on South African film music One would normally contextualize the theoretical framework of a study such as this within the body of existing literature dealing with similar subject matter; however, hardly any sources even mention the topic of South African film music. It is notable that what sources exist are extremely recent, even though the first South African feature film is from 1910, more than one hundred years ago. Because of the limited scholarly material on the topic of South African film music, I contextualize this study in relation to other closely related fields of study. Figure 3 shows the various disciplines that most closely inform the current 8 study. These disciplines serve to create both a theoretical framework and methodological framework.
Figure 3: Related disciplines informing a study of South African film music
National or regional studies of film music from other countries primarily assist in creating a methodological framework. They are useful in contextualizing certain theoretical questions: the relationship between South African and mainstream scoring techniques, for instance, can be contrasted with the relationship between scoring techniques of other smaller film-producing countries and the mainstream market.
The second discipline informing this study is South African film studies. This field has expanded considerably since the end of apartheid, and more particularly since the new millennium. Armes (2008) provide a comprehensive categorization of African and South African feature films, which, together with online sources, particularly IMDb, makes it possible to work from a virtually complete database of titles.
The earliest historical source dealing with South African film is Gutsche (1972), who covers the period 1895-1940. She does not include output of the local film industry, however, only the influence of foreign films on the country. By contrast, one of the most 9 recent sources is Botha (2012), who fills an important gap in the literature by providing a historical overview of South African film from its beginnings to the present day. Unsurprisingly, race and South Africa’s racial policies have been a central issue in South African film studies. Tomaselli (1989), for instance, presents a history of South African film while examining its complicity in legitimizing apartheid. Likewise, Davis (1996a) analyses the role of film in perpetuating racist ideologies. Balseiro and Masilela (2003) provide in-depth analysis of racial issues in key films from South Africa’s history. There are also various sources dealing with cinema culture and reception history in the early years of Cape Town cinema, such as Gainer (2000), Eckardt (2005), and Burns (2009). While the majority of sources in the field of South African film deal with attempts to sort out South Africa’s complicated past, some look to the future, for instance McCluskey (2009), who interviews an array of contemporary South African filmmakers.
Thirdly, issues of film music theory, aesthetics, philosophy, analysis, technique and historiography are influenced by writings on mainstream ‘Hollywood’ film music studies, since it is primarily in the context of such films that these issues have been explicitly addressed. There are several recent histories of American film music, which I review in Chapter 1. These allow the contextualization of South African film music history in the mainstream market, as well as providing a framework of current film music historiographical techniques.
Finally, literature on South African music has been integral to this study. At the outset of the study, I had assumed the literature on South African music that would be most pertinent would be texts on concert music and the predominantly white composers thereof. It became apparent, however, that the literature on popular music by predominantly black composers was in fact more relevant, particularly in relation to the material covered in Chapter 3 and Chapter 4. I review this material in Chapter 1.
10
Research question and objectives Research question The primary research question of the study is:
What role have South African and international musics played in South African film in relation to the representation of South African peoples and cultures, from the country’s first examples of sound film until the rapid expansion of the industry beginning around 1970?
Research objectives The lack of existing research on South African film music influences the objectives of the present study. The current need is for the creation of a relatively broad historical approach, which will be able to map out the scope, parameters and central critical issues for later, more nuanced and historically more specific studies to take place, while also taking a firm position regarding theoretical framework. My objective in these terms has been to formulate a structure allowing for the inclusion of as many primary sources in the form of individual films as possible while maintaining a specific theoretical focus in relation to the included material.
Within the above broad context, the particular aim of the research is to create a critical historical study of South African film music. The history will analyse how film-musical material denotes and connotes representation of racial and social strata in South African film. It achieves this through study of the meaning implications of musical genre, style, expression, pre-existing associations governed by standard tropes of musical meaning, association with lyrics, and any other approach to the generation of musical meaning, as interpreted through the music’s interaction with other narrative elements including visuals, dialogue, sound effects etc. The music is analysed in relation to trends in mainstream film music (particularly Hollywood), and against various domains of meaning including the political, social, economic and technological, when such information is relevant and available. 11
South African film music is one central theme of this study; the other is film music theory. The study aims to contribute to what remains an under-represented area of film music studies, namely the manner in which film music participates in processes of representation.
Research design The research design of the project is a historical-analytical study based on textual criticism. The historical narrative that the project creates is a model of the processes of musical genre, style and expression as tools of representation in South African film music, modulated through time and across sociocultural borders. This historical design forms the framework for the second level of design, namely the music-analytical/critical component of the study, based on the historical data gathered.
Sample design The sample that represents the subject of this study consists of a selection of South African films from a diverse range of genres within the study’s chronological focus period. I have aimed particularly to focus on films that were not represented in other South African film studies—which is the majority of film titles—while also including some of the titles those studies consider important, in order to analyse the role of the musical text within these “seminal” films. Ideally, the study would include films from across the political spectrum, with a focus on films dealing with issues of black South Africans’ lives, most of which would be considered “radical” in the conservative context in which they were made, liberal/alternative films and Afrikaner nationalist film. For space reasons, however, I have concentrated particularly on the poles of this axis. There are a number of interesting films with well-crafted music in the middle category, which merit attention in a later study.
Research methodology The data sources for the study are the primary sources, in the form of the films themselves, and secondary sources drawn from the fields discussed in “The problem of literature on South African film music”. I discuss access to the primary source material in “Sampling methods” below. I then bring the secondary sources to bear on interpretation of the primary sources. 12
Sources on South African film are instrumental in establishing the current domain of discussion around the primary sources, establishing a conceptual framework regarding the interpretation of South African film to date. Sources on South African music provide vital context regarding the artists and their musical styles appearing in the films, particularly regarding the films in Chapter 3 and even more so in Chapter 4. National and regional film music studies predominantly provide a methodological framework, in terms of structure and their relation to the dominant Hollywood formal models. Sources from mainstream film music studies provide context regarding the practice of film theory, analysis and history writing. Reference to recent histories of South Africa grounds the film texts relative to their contemporaneous sociopolitical climate. These sources all contributed to the choice of my specific theoretical framework of film music as representation, enacted through a re-reading of the film texts as colonial artefacts.
Sampling methods I selected films based on a number of criteria. Availability is an important consideration for South African films of this era. SANFVSA is the primary source of material. Some titles, however, are not available in the archives, nor anywhere else. Certain films are in the archives but are not accessible for viewing. Others only exist on very poor-quality 16mm format, and are barely audible. A few titles are commercially available despite not being available in the archives. In recent years, many titles have been commercially released on DVD, which greatly improves accessibility, and has even led to showings on DStv.8 A handful of titles are available in university libraries, and also in arthouse DVD rental outlets: Ultra Video Waverley in Pretoria9 has been one of the best sources of relevant titles, followed by purchasing of titles in retail outlets such as Top CD,10 and online retailers such as takealot11, Kalahari12 and Amazon.13 Villon Films in Vancouver14 distributes some of the oldest, rarest and historically most important titles. Online
8 DStv (Digital Satellite Television) is a satellite television network in South Africa. 9 See https://www.facebook.com/UltraVideoWaverley/timeline. 10 See http://www.topcd.co.za. 11 See http://www.takealot.com. 12 Kalahari has since merged with takealot. 13 See http://www.amazon.com/ref=nav_logo. 14 See http://www.villonfilms.ca. 13 streaming services have also played a role in accessing otherwise-unavailable content, including Netflix15 and Amazon Instant Video.16
Regarding sample size, I aimed for maximum inclusivity within the era under discussion, notwithstanding that, as stated above, my sample design’s focus is on the poles of the political spectrum, namely resistance cinema versus Afrikaner nationalist cinema. Comprehensivity is impossible in a study of the current scope, however. I thus selected titles based on genre and theme. Within themes, however, I have retained an emphasis on maximum comprehensivity or at least inclusivity, partly to award attention to the many unmentioned titles in South African film studies literature. I initially intended to discuss the complete oeuvres of influential industry figures, such as filmmaker Jans Rautenbach or composers Sam Sklair, Roy Martin and Con Lamprecht, but it became apparent that approach would inhibit the thematic plan of the study, especially regarding the central theme of representation. The “Suggestions for further research” section in the Conclusion provides further information on some of the material I found it necessary to exclude.
Analysis of primary source material In almost all cases, the written score for a film is unavailable, having been lost, destroyed or never having existed as a formal document in the first place. This situation is common in film music studies globally. It is thus necessary to enact music analyses based on the recorded audio version of the soundtrack itself. The process of analysis includes watching a film, usually a number of times, and recording the time and musical content of all music cues,17 as a basis for taking into account at least the following considerations:
1. Recurrence of particular musical themes; 2. Genre and style; 3. Instrumentation; 4. Interaction of music with visual, narrative, sound effects and spoken content; 5. Motivic or thematic association with character, concept, landscape etc.
15 See http://www.netflix.com/browse. 16 See http://www.amazon.com/Instant-Video/b?node=2858778011. 17 In film music terminology, a cue is a discrete block of music. A single cue can vary in length from an isolated note or chord to an extended musical statement lasting several minutes. 14
6. Narrative level: diegetic, extra-diegetic, ambidiegetic etc.18 7. Expressive effect the cue seems to aim for; 8. Contextualization of data in relation to: a. other South African films, b. contemporaneous mainstream film music trends, c. pre-existing music, d. contemporaneous sociopolitical, economic, class and/or technological factors;
Interpretation of primary source material Film-musical texts carry meaning in a variety of ways. They frequently include music with pre-existing meaning, for instance, which introduces an additional layer of meaning to the filmic text. Examples include:
1. Popular songs with lyrics; 2. Well-known tunes with pre-associated meanings; 3. Expressive tropes, in the sense of musical signifiers that through standard use have acquired associated meaning familiar to many audiences.
Filmic context can generate meaning as well. Leitmotif is an example of this phenomenon: a particular theme and character are associated, and the theme’s expressive metamorphoses convey information about the character’s psychological or physical status. More commonly, the interaction between music, visuals, dialogue and narrative provides opportunities for the passing of meaning between these elements. The traditional model of film music envisaged music as “supporting” the visuals—meaning already existed through the visual element and was simply enhanced through musical accompaniment. A more contemporary model acknowledges that visual meaning can change entirely through the inclusion of music. It is also the case that visuals, dialogue and narrative can change the meaning of music just as music can change the meaning of these elements.
The final stage of the research methodology, then, is interpretation of the analysed data in light of the theoretical framework. I make use of the above analytical methods to address
18 See footnote 1 of Chapter 1 for further information regarding these terms. 15 the Research question and objectives, applying them to the creation of a model of representation in relation to race, culture and politics, constructing this model through a broadly postcolonial interpretation.
Outline of chapters Chapter 1: Literature Review and Theoretical Framework The literature review addresses the topics set out in Figure 1 above. The review of national and regional film music studies in particular aims for thoroughness and some level of detail—my rationale is that studies of non-Hollywood film music remain quite rare. As far as I have discovered, no comprehensive review of such material exists, while the need for one does exist in order to consolidate work in the field, which remains minimal in relation to material dealing with Hollywood. Chapter 2: From Silents to Sound Film Chapter 2 consolidates available knowledge on scoring and performance practice in pre- 1931 South African film, before covering the transition to the early years of dramatic underscoring in South African film composition, up to 1938. Chapter 3: Rural African Music in South African Film Chapter 3 focusses on the role that African music has played in the South African feature film. It analyses the implications of diegetic vs extra-diegetic implementation of African music, and charts the shifting nature of representation through African music from early depictions encouraging colonial stereotypes of violent tribesmen to later contexts in which greater agency enables music as anti-apartheid statement. Chapter 4: Urban African Music in South African Film Chapter 4 follows a similar thematic approach to Chapter 3, but with a focus on representation through urban, popular music, and to a lesser extent rural music displaced to the urban environment. Chapter 5: Afrikaner Nationalism and Film Music Chapter 5 looks at an era of South African film frequently glossed over in film studies, due to its saturation by turgid melodrama, escapist, slapstick comedy and overt nationalism. The representation of Afrikaner nationalism through the repurposing of a wide variety of musical influences is nonetheless of considerable interest in terms of film music theory, South African film studies and even South African history. Strategies of representation of 16 nationalism through film music are separated into distinct categories and interpreted accordingly. 17 Chapter 1 Literature Review and Theoretical Framework
The lack of an extended body of literature on South African film music requires that I demarcate the boundaries of my own theoretical framework and of the field in general as it overlaps with related fields. I have organized the current chapter in relation to these inter-related fields as mapped out in Figure 3 above. The chapter thus consists of three sections: South African film and music studies, National film music studies and Mainstream film music studies. The first two sections are particularly concerned with representation and identity as addressed by the sources reviewed. The third section offers a more general contextualization of my approach to film music theory and analysis.
The first section, South African film and music studies, addresses the available literature on film music studies, film studies and music studies. Regarding film music studies, the body of literature is sufficiently limited that I have attempted to include all sources that address the topic. Regarding film studies, I review most of the available books on the topic, and explore how they relate to and influence my theoretical framework. Regarding music studies, I review a selection of sources, predominantly covering black popular music, that have been instrumental in contextualizing the musical sources encountered in the films.
The second section, National film music studies, reviews the limited scholarship available on film music in countries other than the USA. Although such scholarship is not extensive, I do not aim for comprehensivity—my concern is to analyse the themes that such studies have concentrated on, with particular reference to exploring the not-infrequent intersections with my own conceptual framework. The review makes apparent that these non-mainstream studies demonstrate a concern for issues of identity and film-musical representation that has played very much a secondary role in mainstream film music studies.
The third section, Mainstream film music studies, reviews mainstream approaches to the theory, analysis and history of film music. In the “Theory of film music” section I critique certain sources that have been treated as seminal, analysing some of the conclusions these 18 texts reach, for instance that musicology generally and music analysis specifically have a subordinate role to play in film music studies. Such assumptions, I argue, have had a detrimental effect on film music analysis. I also explore the creation of film-musical meaning through an updated model of the functions of film music. “Analysis of film music” explores some contemporary approaches to film music analysis. The “History of film music” section provides a brief review of sources addressing mainstream film music history.
South African film and music studies Film music A limited number of sources address the topic of music in South African film. Most of these deal with source music—that is, pre-existing music taken from other sources. This may be in the form of popular music, heard diegetically or extra-diegetically;1 or traditional song, usually heard diegetically. Discussion of actual underscore2 is rare. I aim in this study towards inclusivity regarding approaches to film music;3 the study thus covers both underscore (predominantly extra-diegetic) and source music (predominantly diegetic).4
1 The terms diegesis and extra-diegesis, in themselves quite straightforward, have been the focus of increasing attention in film music scholarship, often with the goal of demonstrating these concepts as continua rather than opposites. “Extra-diegetic” is Wierzbicki’s (2009) preferred term for the older “nondiegetic”, which in his opinion gives undue precedence to the term “diegetic” by virtue of the negative “non”. I have adopted this terminology throughout this study. Gorbman (1987: 22) introduced the notion of the “meta-diegetic”, referring to music taking place within the imagination of a diegetic character. Holbrook (2011: xviii) ascribes the term “ambi-diegetic” to diegetic music which furthers the narrative in ways normally reserved for extra-diegetic music. Stilwell draws attention to moments of diegetic/extra-diegetic ambiguity, where boundaries cross between these categories, marking “important moments of revelation, of symbolism, and of emotional engagement within the film and without” (2007: 200). Reyland (2012: 122) makes brief mention of the “para-diegetic”, but neglects to provide adequate context for interpretation of the term’s meaning. 2 “Underscore” refers to extra-diegetic music designed to provide dynamic meaning through direct and close interaction with the expressive or physical action of a film. This is in contrast to a compilation or soundtrack score, constructed from discrete, sometimes pre-existing, popular songs, which typically integrates less thoroughly with the visual aspect of the film. 3 Michael Chion distinguishes this more inclusive approach to film’s musical elements through the use of the terms “film music” versus “music in film”, the former referring specifically to the conventional practice of symphonic underscore, the latter to all elements of the soundtrack that could conceivably fall into the category of music (Haines 2013: 29). 4 This approach is increasingly common; see for instance Chion (1994), who theorizes such an approach, and Coyle (2005), who applies this inclusivity to analysis of Australian film music. 19
Discussion of the former predominantly takes place in Chapter 2 and Chapter 5, as they predominantly deal with Afrikaans (often nationalist-oriented) film that to an extent aspires to the norms of Hollywood and thus favours orchestral underscore. Discussion of the latter predominantly takes place in Chapter 3 and Chapter 4. These chapters deal specifically with African music, which tends to be heard diegetically for both political and technical reasons. Politically, as these chapters will discuss, diegetic music can function as a form of othering; and technically, there is a lack of established tradition regarding the expressive links between film and African music in comparison with the Hollywood model of film and music.
Die Brandwag5 provides some of the earliest discussions of music in relation to South African film. Dr Hans Rompel, head of the Reddingsdaadbond-Amateur-Rolprent- Organisasie (RARO),6 most typically cited in his capacity as author of Die bioskoop in die diens van die volk (1942), here contributes an article about the poor quality of music performed at the cinema7 during intervals between films (Rompel 1937). Rompel accuses the musicians of repeatedly and exclusively playing a very limited repertoire of poor- quality, hackneyed light music. He appeals for them to play serious classical music instead—Beethoven, Brahms, Wagner, Schumann etc. The article’s primary interest lies in the evidence it provides of the practice of musicians in film theatres. This is a phenomenon that Gutsche (1972) also makes occasional but always brief mention of. According to Gutsche, as of 1933 the Colosseum Theatre in Johannesburg was the only film theatre with an orchestra (236). Rompel fills in the gap concerning musical practice in other theatres:
5Die Brandwag was an Afrikaans periodical that ran sporadically through much of the first half of the twentieth century. 6 Botha (2012: 28) translates the name as the “Rescue Action League Amateur Film Organisation”. See Tomaselli (1983: 71-75) and Gutsche (1972: 263-264) for further discussion of Rompel and RARO. 7 Or bioscope, to use the terminology current in South Africa at the time the article was written. 20
In al die bioskope van ons land word vóór die voorstelling en gedurende die pouse musiek gespeel en in sommige bioskope word ook gedurende die voorstelling nog wel 'n musiektussenspel gelewer - hetsy op die orrel, hetsy met 'n orkessie, hetsy met plate en 'n besonder suiwere elektro- grammofoon. (1937)
[In all the film theatres in our country, before the show and during intermission, music is played, and in some cinemas during the show a musical interlude might also be provided - either on the organ, or with an ensemble, or with records and a particularly pure electro- gramophone.]
Two other articles from Die Brandwag deal with composition of underscore, but their focus is strictly international: Die Brandwag (1950) introduces the musical personnel and workflow at Twentieth Century Fox, while Kamera (1950) provides a brief overview of well-known film composers from the U.S.A. and Europe, including Denmark, Czechoslovakia and Holland. Regrettably, South African film composers and their music do not feature.
When sources from South African music studies discuss film music, they tend to focus on the genre of the musical rather than on the use of underscore in feature films. Particularly popular in this regard are the musicals that were produced in the late 1940s to early 1950s— African Jim (1949 dir. Donald Swanson), Zonk! (1950 dir. Hyman Kirstein), Song of Africa (1951 dir. Emil Nofal) and to a lesser extent The Magic Garden (19518 dir. Donald Swanson).9 This selection of films is popular because they are some of the very few
8 Some sources, such as Moses (Date Unknown1) and Tomaselli (2006: 102) cite the date of The Magic Garden as 1961. This is the date of the South African premiere. The film was produced in 1951. 9 Other authors who discuss these films include Davis (1996a), Bickford-Smith (2000), Maingard (2007) and Modisane (2010). These three films, together with Cry, the Beloved Country (1951) and The Magic Garden (1951), have probably received more attention than almost any other South African films, with the possible exception of Jans Rautenbach’s early films. This selection perhaps bears testimony to scholars’ desire for a national cinema, a desire unfortunately not catered to by the larger body of South African film. A film that has been curiously overlooked is Dilemma (1962 dir. Henning Carlsen), despite the film’s candid reflection of interracial relations of the period. Like these other films, it foregrounds black African actors, includes onscreen performances by South African jazz musicians and a music credit for Gideon Nxumalo, and is based on a novel by Nadine Gordimer. I discuss the film further in Chapter 4. 21 apartheid-era films that actually depicted black South Africans in starring roles, able to demonstrate agency themselves through their own musical and acting talents rather than appearing as extras, almost always cast as servants or labourers, in the background. Muller (2004) documents the use of music in these films related to the influence of American music as experienced through the film medium by (particularly black) South Africans in the post 2nd World War period specifically, and how these influences were apparent both in local performance culture and, feeding back into film, in Zonk! itself.10 This influence forms the basis of my reading of African Jim in Chapter 4. Muller (2008: 44-45) also includes a musicological categorization of South African musical genres performed in Zonk! and mention of a number of post-apartheid South African films that feature South African music in their soundtracks, though stops short of including the scores at large in the category of South African music (46).
Despite the predominantly musical nature of Zonk! and Song of Africa, Maingard (2007) approaches them with little reference to their music, focussing instead on representation of black identity through costume and dance in Zonk!, and deconstruction of Song of Africa’s fictionalized presentation of black South Africans’ place in apartheid society. One might expect a study like Olwage (ed., 2008) to include some reference to film music; the book’s subtitle of “music for and against apartheid” is highly applicable to South African film music. The closest reference to film, however, is Allen’s mention of the Zonk! stage production that predated the film (Allen 2008: 80). Allen (2005: 36-38) also discusses pennywhistle player Willard Cele’s experiences of his starring role in The Magic Garden.
The musical content of African Jim has perhaps received most focus. In one of the few studies to concern itself explicitly with the soundtrack, Dovey and Impey (2010) revisit African Jim in an exploration of the use of music by African musicians as a carrier of political subtext understandable by black South African audiences but not by the white authorities, nor by the foreign filmmakers themselves.11 One of the fuller accounts of
10 See Gainer (2000) for further analysis of the influence of American culture through film in Cape Town during this period. 11 However, it is apparent from the interview with Erica Rutherford in the documentary In Darkest Hollywood: Cinema and Apartheid (1993 dir. Peter Davis and Daniel Riesenfeld) that the 22 music in South African film, though with a focus on the careers of the performers who appear in the films rather than on the music itself, is Fleming (2012), which is also unusual in bridging the gap between musicological and film studies, drawing on sources from both fields. Finally, Modisane (2013b) provides a brief section on song and dance in African Jim, though this tends towards a level of abstraction that avoids engagement with the musical texts.
The musical has therefore received a certain degree of attention in recent scholarship. Discussion of the use of music in non-musicals is less common. It is quite common for film studies scholars, for instance Botha (2012: 66), to make occasional brief reference to scores or composers, typically no more than a single line of general information, noting the composer’s name or the general effectiveness of the music. Aside from these sporadic references, there are a handful of articles, discussed below, that explore the topic to greater or lesser degrees.
Hees (2009) explores musical meaning in the film Jerusalema (2008), focussing on the use of the traditional song of the same name, coupled with another song of the same name by the credited composer, Alan Lazar. These songs underscore the concept implied in the film’s name, that of post-1994 Johannesburg (and by extension the whole “new South Africa”) as a land of hope and promise. Depending on one’s point of view, the actions of the film’s protagonist, Lucky Kunene (Rapulana Seiphemo) either fulfil or soil the promise and potential of the city. Hees avoids discussion of Lazar’s actual underscore. Hees (2004) has also briefly explored the use of music in the film Proteus (2003 dir. John Greyson). Although rather general given the review format of the source, Hees’s primary focus is on the contrast created between European and Khoisan12 musical elements, especially as a means of signifying difference and the Other. As mentioned, this othering through contrast
filmmakers became aware of the meaning of the song in question during the production of the film, and made a specific choice to include it. 12 The term “Khoisan” is a portmanteau of “Khoikhoi” and “San”. It is a collective term for two distinct groups of people who were the oldest inhabitants of Southern Africa. The former were herders, the latter hunter-gatherers. As explained by Levin (no date), both words come from the Khoikhoi language, and respectively mean “men of men” and “people different from ourselves”. The term “Bossiesman” or “Bushman” was also used by the Dutch colonists to refer to the hunter- gathering San. 23 between European/African music, cast most often as a contrast between extra- diegetic/diegetic music, is discussed in Chapter 3 and Chapter 4.
Rijskdijk and Haupt (2007) explore this theme of othering through musical genre further in relation to Tsotsi (2005 dir. Gavin Hood). They argue for an interpretation of the film’s contrasting musical genres (principally kwaito and a Hollywood-influenced orchestral underscore) as signifiers of the main character’s path to redemption from “sociopathic menace” to “emotionally recuperated individual” (29). Generally, the polarities of compilation score and through-composed underscore frequently work, if not in isolation from one another, at least as binary opposites in terms of signification. Rijsdijk and Haupt make use of this standard polarization as a starting point for a deconstructive reading, convincingly arguing that Tsotsi utilizes the interaction of these elements to create an important layer of narrative meaning. They achieve this through the association of the pre- existing kwaito elements of the soundtrack with Tsotsi’s initial emotionally detached criminal character, and of the more gradual association of the instrumental underscore with his final, redeemed character. In this way, the authors also succeed in formulating a unified, integrated discussion of both the “source music”, or pre-existing popular music elements, and the specifically created orchestral underscore. Treatment of these elements as equally important musical signifiers is a relatively recent phenomenon; Knight and Wojcik comment, for instance, that “[u]ntil recently, film music criticism has largely ignored popular music in favour of analysing the classical nondiegetic film score” (2001: 5). Othering thus takes place in Tsotsi not simply through genre, but also through source music versus underscore—typically the source music would also be diegetic, furthering the distancing and thus othering process, though in this case both are extra-diegetic.
Hees (2009) and Rijsdijk and Haupt (2007) share a focus on aspects of the soundtrack which carry clear signifiers of extramusical meaning: songs with lyrics, and the “compilation” elements of the soundtrack consisting of pre-existing music by established artists. Preference for discussion of diegetic music is closely related to the tendency of South African film music studies towards the musical, a genre that also relies on the use of diegetic music, albeit in a non-realistic manner that enhances the inherent fantasy and escapism of cinema, encouraging audiences to further suspend disbelief in exchange for 24 suspension of reality. These diegetic elements provide static meaning: they tend to characterize, rather than narrativize, the film. Such music tends to occur where narrative progression takes a secondary role to characterization of individuals or of the film itself. Examples include Tsotsi and his gang walking down the street; Tsotsi running blindly across the no-man’s-land adjoining the township, echoing his similar run as a small child escaping his violent, Aids-ravaged home; or Lucky Kunene’s mother in Jerusalema singing with her choir in an empty field. The authors foreground these musical moments of explicit extramusical signification relative to the specifically composed underscore, or the parts that narrativize rather than characterize.
Two recent studies by Letcher, however, actively engage with extra-diegetic underscore. Letcher (2016a) returns to discussion of Proteus. In this article and Letcher (2016b), which engages with the underscore for the multinational production Goodbye Bafana (2007 dir. Bille August), Letcher focusses on two films that have actively introduced indigenous South African music into the underscore, exploring how both the processes of music production and the resulting soundtracks influence issues of representation. Robert Hatten’s theory of “markedness” is drawn upon to demonstrate the unequal relationships that arise between indigenous and Western musics in the production process (specifically regarding Proteus) and the underscore (in the case of Goodbye Bafana). These two studies thus provide something of a snapshot of the future state of a trajectory I map out in the current study, namely the extent to which African music in a filmic context becomes subject, rather than object, and is able to take its place as a key element of the extra-diegetic underscore.
Letcher (2009) investigates the collaborative process between composer and filmmaker, offering an almost autoethnographic perspective of the processes involved in the creation of the score for the 2007 South African/Danish film My Black Little Heart. The body of the article looks at some specific examples of what Holbrook (2011: xviii) would term “ambidiegetic” music: that is, diegetic music that nevertheless plays an important role in meaning creation such as characterization and narrative development. The article discusses 25 the Hollywood-style template of commercial score production involving spotting13 and the use of temp tracks14 in the context of South African film production. This highlights a historical shift in approach which may have taken place in the South African industry, which one source at least suggests used to be significantly less formalized. Fox (2010: 253-257) is one other of the very few written sources in which a film composer working on a South African film documents the process of film scoring. The Los Angeles composer Charles Fox describes his experiences of working with Jamie Uys in scoring The Gods Must be Crazy II (1989, dir. Jamie Uys). It appears he was granted considerable artistic licence regarding the actual scoring, but that this was heavily undermined by Uys’s re- editing of the film after the score had been edited to picture, effectively destroying Fox’s original aesthetic intentions. Although only one example, this haphazard approach would suggest that the South African industry lacked a formal, standardized model for the creation of underscore and its interaction with the visual element, even on a large-scale production such as this one. Letcher’s study can be read as an attempt to document precisely this sort of information regarding standard practices in the South African industry.
Film While studies of South African film music are severely limited in number and scope, there is a reasonable body of literature in the form of books, dissertations, articles and television documentaries detailing various aspects of the history of South African film.15 These range from general historical overviews to specific analyses of individual films, and the literature can therefore be divided into subcategories based on its approach to material on a continuum of most general to most specific.
13 Spotting is a preliminary process in mainstream film scoring in which composer, director, music editor and other musical roleplayers view the film and make decisions regarding placement of music. 14 “Temp tracks” are a common phenomenon in mainstream film music, as any book on Hollywood scoring practices will explain (See for instance Davis (1999) and Karlin and Wright (2004)). The music editor, in consultation with the director, creates a temporary music score consisting of pre- existing music, which serves the dual function of assisting the production team in developing a sense of the effect of the finished product, and illustrating the filmmakers’ vision to the composer. 15 Udeman (1972), a bibliography of South African film, provides references for certain out-of- print periodicals that would otherwise be difficult to discover. 26
The most general material consists of lists of South African films. Several of these lists, particularly those of Armes and Moses, have proved very important to my own study. The most comprehensive is Armes (2008), followed by Moses (Date unknown1-5). Moses is in general comprehensive but omits the majority of “Blaxploitation” productions, those films produced by white filmmakers for black film audiences in the 1970s to 1980s under the B Subsidy scheme. Moses’s list includes brief, personal descriptions of each film. Lists of films can be found as appendices in other publications as well, specifically Blignaut and Botha (1992),16 Tomaselli (1983);17 Tomaselli (1988),18 and Treffry-Goatley (2010).19
Second in generality to these lists are historical overviews. The earliest and most frequently cited of these is Gutsche (1972). Gutsche provides invaluable insight into the socioeconomic circumstances in which film occurred in the early years of South African cinema. Her near-exclusive focus on international productions limits the book as a source for study of the South African industry, however. Although there is limited chronological overlap between the period covered by the current study and Gutsche’s study, her occasional mentions of musical practice in the early years of the industry, which I have consolidated into a single narrative in Chapter 2, lay a foundation for further study of this period.
Until very recently there was no book-length publication aimed at providing a reasonably comprehensive picture of the history of South African film besides le Roux and Fourie (1982). This text lists and describes thoroughly but without any attempt at critical evaluation or placement within social, political and historical context. Ideologically it aims to be inoffensive to the authorities of the period, omitting those few films critical of apartheid such as Come Back, Africa (1959 dir. Lionel Rogosin) and Dilemma. The publication of Botha’s (2012) historical study of South African film, covering the industry from the first projected motion pictures until 2010, rectified the lack of a book-length study of a more critical nature.20 Botha (2012) demonstrates how social, political and economic
16 Lists feature films produced in the period 1979-1991. 17 Lists films produced between 1910 and 1980. 18 Lists films produced between 1910 and 1985. 19 Lists post-apartheid films between 1994 and 2009. 20 This text is an expansion of Botha (2006), an article-length history of South African film. 27 factors gave rise to escapist South African cinema, encouraging mediocrity and a refusal to engage with the country’s urgent social issues, or with the filmic experimentation and innovation occurring in other countries.21 Leon van Nierop has also documented South African film history, firstly on radio (Van Nierop (2010); see also Peterjasie (Date Unknown) for a transcription of the show), then in the television series Daar doer in die Fliek (2012). Van Nierop’s approach is in keeping with the requirements of the popular media of radio and television, tending towards non-critical descriptive historical narrative with behind-the-scenes interviews of actors and directors.
The above sources tend towards narrative history with limited recourse to a specific theoretical framework. In contrast to this approach, and serving as essential background information to the analysis in the current study, Tomaselli (1983) and (1988/9) document a range of external factors that have fundamentally influenced the structure of the industry and its content. They follow a broad historical view, but with the aim of demonstrating how the policy of apartheid as an ideology of both race and control of capital manipulates the industry. Tomaselli (1988/9) documents a politically unconscientized film industry that, while producing supposedly apolitical material, is in fact highly political in its commitment to the status quo and non-engagement with real social issues. Tomaselli’s analysis demonstrates the control of content through censorship, state subsidy schemes and distribution channels. In similar vein, Botha (1995) demonstrates how apartheid policies of segregation, censorship, subsidy schemes and a flawed tax incentive scheme have undermined the possibility of a national South African film industry, resulting instead in a high level of fragmentation.
Like Tomaselli, Davis (1996a) also centres his history of South African film on the influence of racial ideology. Tomaselli documents how external influences on the film industry affected racial and social representation within film. Davis engages primarily in
21 Botha (2012) also possesses some regrettable shortcomings, however. It omits large portions of the history; the content of particular sections sometimes exceeds the thematic boundaries set out by the section title; and it repeats some material almost verbatim in different sections of the book, while on at least one occasion radically changing the meaning of the text. For instance, “a few inferior paternalistic films for blacks” (13) becomes “a few hundred paternalistic films for blacks” (52). 28 textual readings of the films, analysing representation of black actors and African themes throughout the history of the South African film industry. In this sense, Davis documents the specific outcomes of Tomaselli’s political and socioeconomic analysis.
Moving further in the direction of the specific, Botha and van Aswegen (1992) focus on the small number of apartheid-era films which engage with the country’s “political, social and psychological realities… and cannot be described as escapist entertainment” (6). They analyse a selection of films from the 1980s, all of which are alternative in the sense not just of the themes they deal with but—as a direct result of these themes—in the funding and distribution models they need to use in order to be created and presented to the public. While the study’s objectives are similar to those of Tomaselli (1983 and 1988/9) and Davis (1996a), namely analysing the impact of racial ideology on the structures of the film industry and film itself, it achieves these objectives through an alternative approach to sample design through its focus on film that critiques rather than implicitly or explicitly supports apartheid.22 These two trends in sample design represent the primary streams of South African film criticism. My own approach includes both these streams, broadly divided into colonial/apartheid content in Chapter 2 and Chapter 5, and critique in Chapter 3 and Chapter 4. The focus on musical texts introduces an additional layer to this binary model, however, in which music can disrupt the narrative of colonial/apartheid films through a contemporary reading in which African music intended to be “invisible” becomes visible. This gives a voice to previously voiceless characters, or breaks down the “reality” of the narrative through discrepancies that would have been invisible to the original target audience. The most well known example of such is that discussed above in relation to African Jim; the analysis in the first half of Chapter 3 is based on this type of critique through such examples of “invisible” music disrupting the film text.
Most of the recent scholarship on South African film has relied on identity as a key concept. Maingard (2007) focuses mainly on the early years of South African film to support an analysis of the representation and creation of national identity in film. Clear from the choice of films is the fact that South Africa’s historical narrative is ever dependent on the
22 Or proto-apartheid ideology, in the case of pre-1948 material. 29 national identity imaginary. Statements of “national” identity occur in films as ideologically distant as the nation-building epics of the early years (De Voortrekkers, The Symbol of Sacrifice and Building a Nation23/Die Bou van ‘n Nasie) and the once-banned Come Back, Africa. Grades of middle ground in between allow the representation of African identity while not threatening the status quo of white supremacy, such as Zonk!, Song of Africa and Cry, the Beloved Country. Maingard identifies the subsidy system as a milestone in the cementing of a particular approach to a non-inclusive type of national identity.
A number of doctoral theses have been written on aspects of South African film in the last five years. The overarching theoretical framework of racial identity is at the core of all of these theses. Paleker (2009) examines the body of B-Scheme films produced specifically for black audiences during the 1970s and 1980s, and their role in the construction of African identity. The theme of black identity is also central to Modisane (2010), who theorizes the role of film in the stimulation of public critical engagement both pre- and post-apartheid, choosing a selection of films for analysis relevant to the representation of black identity. Treffry-Goatley (2010) expands Maingard’s focus on national identity further into the realm of post-apartheid film, exploring through policy documents and film analysis the extent to which industry structures have evolved from a focus on exclusively white identities to the representation of a range of identities. With a focus specifically on white rather than black identity, Riley (2012) examines the evolution of the onscreen presentation of Cape landscapes during the apartheid era as signification of changing perspectives by filmmakers of the Cape and its residents, specifically from Afrikaner utopia to apartheid dystopia.24
23 Most sources refer to the English version of this film as They Built a Nation (e.g. Davis (1996a) and Moses (date unknown1)), a trend going as far back as, and possibly introduced by, Gutsche (1972). The title card of the English version, however, gives the name as Building a Nation. Throughout this study, I refer to the film by its English name, because I predominantly consulted this version. The English and Afrikaans versions, however, including the music, appear to be identical in all respects besides language. 24 Gugler (2003) deserves mention here: a rare non-South African writer on South African film, he provides introductory analyses to a small selection of films, chosen because of their differing directorial viewpoints and specific manner of negotiating apartheid. 30
The final category on the trajectory from general to specific is collections of essays. Blignaut and Botha (1992) aim to provide a comprehensive picture of film in the 1980s— its current state, the historical factors that resulted in its arriving at that state, and its prospective future development. Articles and opinions are collected from all sectors with a stake in film—filmmakers, academics and critics. Articles include evaluations of genre films, profiles of individual directors, analyses of the state of the industry, problems of distribution in South African cinema and the disaster of the tax incentive scheme. As such, the book complements Tomaselli (1988/9), serving as a collection of personal reflections from stakeholders, which is contextualized by Tomaselli’s analysis of the apartheid state’s manipulation of the industry. The picture created is of an industry in crisis and disarray— the suspect financial dealings of the film industry to support the production of films that made no sense outside of the context of their own introversive and capital-driven world is a perfect analogy of apartheid itself; a case of art mirroring life. Maingard (2007: 125) has hinted at this analogy, claiming of the state subsidy system introduced in 1956 that it was “moulded over the next three decades into a tool that would cinematically replicate apartheid”.
Balseiro and Masilela (2003) follow a familiar historical trajectory, covering De Voortrekkers, Cry, the Beloved Country and Come Back, Africa. Beittel’s chapter on Cry, the Beloved Country, together with earlier versions of Maingard’s scholarship on national identity and Saks’s on the South African film industry’s role in the country’s attempts to achieve a new representation of itself, mark identity as once more central.25
The title of Botha (ed., 2007)—Marginal lives and painful pasts—captures perfectly the defining nature of filmic themes in South Africa’s post-apartheid cinema, as the stories of the previously-oppressed are finally allowed to emerge, and are doing so in considerable number.26 The section on feature films is therefore primarily an analysis of themes of “injustice, guilt, atonement, redemption and reconciliation” (Renders 2007: 224). A subtler
25 For the continuation of this argument in later studies, see Saks (2001) and Saks (2010). 26 In the current decade, the trend appears to be heading away from social justice issues applicable to all who suffered under apartheid towards more personal stories of unique, individual experiences, not counting the recent return to the 1980s trend of producing faux-Hollywood films, such as Vehicle 19 (2013) and Khumba (2013). 31 approach to racial interaction is also fostered, however: Wozniak approaches the issue from the more unusual angle of the clash of spiritual belief systems as depicted in post-apartheid film—the films in question are continuing a theme first addressed by Jamie Uys in Dingaka (1964). Race was not the only basis for repression under apartheid, of course—sex and sexuality could also be cause for victimization. Glenn specifically addresses the representation of interracial sex in film, and a section of the book is devoted to Queer cinema, including analysis of recent Queer films together with Queer re-readings of older films, such as Frederik Burgers’s frequent cross-dressing appearances in 1950s comedies (Peach 2007: 54-58). Another text of considerable value to the study particularly of post- apartheid film is McCluskey (2009), who interviews a selection of film industry personnel—predominantly directors, with some writers, producers and actors included. McCluskey interview candidates are mostly young, black filmmakers, with some more established figures who played an active role in resisting apartheid through film.
Significant gaps exist in the literature on South African film in relation to certain periods and genres. Very limited literature is available on the silent film era. Aside from discussion of De Voortrekkers, Davis (1996a) is perhaps the most extensive source on this period. The 1940s has been glossed over as well.27 Botha (2006 and 2012) makes little mention of film in this period, besides brief mention of African Jim, Kom Saam, Vanaand and Geboortegrond. Maingard (2007) also omits discussion of the period, again with the exception of African Jim. Le Roux and Fourie (1982: 31-40) provide a seemingly comprehensive catalogue of films from the 1940s, though the aim of the text does not extend beyond cataloguing with occasional interesting trivia regarding the production process. This trend is perhaps reversing, as writers recognize this gap and offer more extended analyses of these films.28 The comedies of the 1950s, most of which involve a combination of contributions from Pierre de Wet, Al Debbo and Frederik Burgers, have also received minimal attention. Coverage of the 1960s is also patchy; even those films offering a relatively interesting study of (predominantly white) social issues are under-
27 This may be for pragmatic reasons: many of the 1940s films are only available in the national film archives, and some of the viewing copies available are in poor condition. 28 See for instance Riley (2012), who provides probably the most substantial available analysis to date of Simon Beyers. 32 represented (such as Gordon Vorster’s Die Vlugteling (1960) and Basie (1961) and Ivan Hall’s Dr Kalie (1968)). Generally, the focus has been on the films on both sides of the racial/political divide that present their affiliations most strongly (such as Come Back, Africa and Building a Nation), or which actively engage with the country’s racial issues, even if in a more ambivalent manner (such as Dingaka).
Music Musicologists studying South African black urban popular music have expressed a certain amount of interest in the use of music in a very particular group of South African films. The late 1940s to early 1950s saw a brief flourishing of films that foregrounded Africans in urban spaces together with the urban musical forms they produced and consumed. This foregrounding provides a rare visual historical documentation of performance by some of the most famous bands and performers of the era. The focus of the musicologists who have written about these films tends to be predominantly on contextualizing the films within the careers of the musicians who appear in them. How sympathetically these studies’ authors interpret the filmmakers’ motivations for making these films varies from author to author. The reading by Ansell (2005: 75) is the least forgiving:
The 1949 movie Jim Comes to Jo’burg29 was one of a handful of South African films (including The Magic Garden, Song of Africa, and Zonk!, a film version of the World War II Native Corps revue) that was made for the black cinemas. Most told similar moralising tales of a young rural man, coming to and being corrupted by the big city and realising he would be better off back in his tribal reserve.
Ansell’s description of these films is overly general and not particularly applicable to the titles she mentions. She appears to suggest they were all made to function as propaganda pieces in support of government land policies. This is neither fair nor true in the case of African Jim and The Magic Garden; more fair, however, for Song of Africa, which narrates a tale of a black protagonist achieving success in the (fantasy, black middle-class) city but
29 It is not clear at what point the film African Jim acquired this alternative title; many scholars, from the fields of both film and music, refer to it as such, though the film’s official title is African Jim, and there seems to be no official basis for referring to it as Jim Comes to Jo’burg. 33 still desiring to return to family life in rural Natal. Muller (2008: 46) exhibits greater trust in the motives of the white producers of these films:
South African jazz was one genre initially formed through regular visits to local movie theaters to see American-made musicals and Westerns…. White South Africans sought to harness this talent and enthusiasm on film and to export it to Britain in the postwar era in three films: African Jim…; Song of Africa…; and Zonk!…. These films are treasured witnesses to a remarkable era in South African performance history that was soon to be brutally silenced by the apartheid government.
For Muller then, these films represent the unfulfilled promise of a Hollywood-style symbiosis of black musical talent with the economic resources and technical production know-how of the white-owned film studios30, of the sort demonstrated by the Hollywood productions Stormy Weather (1943 dir. Andrew Stone) and Cabin in the Sky (1943 dir. Vincente Minnelli). This promise, and the extent and implications of its achievement, serves as the basis for my analysis of African Jim in Chapter 4.
Disappointingly, Coplan (2008) addresses the above-mentioned films, together with Come Back, Africa, from a film studies perspective rather than a film music studies one. Coplan (2008: 182) provides some background to the Zonk band.
The South African music studies texts discussed in this section are relevant to my study not for the rather scant information on South African film they include, but for the framework they offer for the understanding of the music and musicians who appear within the films. Interestingly, I have not encountered any content in my film analyses that would benefit from the support of studies of South African concert music. The schism between the worlds of concert and commercial music within the country must partly be responsible for this fact; the nature of the films themselves, and the type of music appropriate to those films, likely also contributes. The most explicit link between the two worlds is through
30 Doughty (2009: 329-330) posits that aside from the obvious economic imperatives, the predominantly Jewish-controlled Hollywood studios adopted stories of black oppression as a “metaphorical blackface” for the stories of Jewish oppression which would have been unpopular in the USA at that time. 34
Andrew Tracey, an ethnomusicologist specializing in African music, who was involved in the creation of the soundtrack of The Naked Prey (1966 dir. Cornel Wilde).
Theoretical relevance of film and music studies My study draws a number of key concepts from the areas of South African film and music studies. Identity—cultural, racial, social and national—is a central concept to many of these studies: my own study is centrally concerned with representation of these forms of identity. The parameters of identity have been defined by the tendency of scholars towards conceptualization of the industry through study of its component parts in the form of alternative versus nationalist film output. Through the inclusion of the musical text, I extend this conceptualization to include the middle ground created within individual films through the tension arising between musical signifiers and signifiers from the narrative, visual and dialogic elements. This tension occurs principally between signifiers of Europe and signifiers of Africa, recognized by some authors as a strategy of othering, and frequently exposed within the films addressed in my own study as an extra- diegetic/diegetic binary. I expose this tension partly through a rereading of previously “invisible” music to disrupt the films’ original narrative strategies (or my own perceptions thereof). Such readings are central to the first half of Chapter 3 particularly. The contextualization of South African film music in relation to mainstream film, which authors such as Muller (2008) and Fleming (2012) demonstrate to be an important element in the musicals of the early 1950s, is important to my reading of African Jim in Chapter 4, and the contextualization of Afrikaans cinema in Chapter 5.
National film music studies I have developed my methodological framework with reference to national film music studies enacted in other countries. My use of the term “national” in this context excludes the USA, which is covered under “Mainstream film music studies”. Not all films made in the United States necessarily belong to the mainstream, “Hollywood” category of course, since it is perfectly possible for films made in the USA to follow subcultural, non- 35 mainstream trends.31 Film scholarship, however, has largely focussed on the mainstream output.32
Most of the national cinemas listed in this section are Western in origin—Britain; continental Europe; Australia; and the Soviet Union, which while not politically Western, artistically and musically has commonalities with the West. Film music scholarship outside of this tradition, such as study of Third Cinema film music, is apparently rare. Tinhorão (1972) focusses on Brazilian feature film and documentary music, though whether in a Third and/or First Cinema context is unclear. Regarding Africa, a recent PhD thesis, Ndaliko (2013), appears to come closest to this goal, covering Third Cinema and music (though not specifically music in Third Cinema) in relation to the Democratic Republic of Congo.
A rare example of African film music scholarship is Lachman (2013), who explores the use of music in relation to gender and politics in the French-Tunisian film Le Chant des Mariées (2008 dir. Karin Albou). Fisher (2016: 7), who focusses on the study of music in West African cinema, likewise identifies lack of music-specific African film scholarship as a general issue: “African film scholarship (in line with the majority of film scholarships) tends to consider the visual track and/or narrative form of film at the exclusion of the sonic components.” Fisher’s own work focusses on intersections of the griot tradition and film music, expanding previous analyses of the importance of this tradition to filmic narrative to show how its role “drives both music and oral narrative techniques to a status of primary importance” (2016: 7). This framework of the importance of the griot in relation to music serves as a prism through various studies by Fisher, demonstrating how music mediates a position for both global and local film consumers in films that would otherwise be inaccessible for international audiences (Fisher 2012), and how adoption of griot-inspired
31 Slobin (2008: xi) lists some of these. Aside from Yiddish and African American film, he lists “Chicano, Asian American, Native American, feminist, and a ‘queer’ gay and lesbian body of work and criticism”. 32 Slobin (2008) makes a variety of gradations of distinction between non-Hollywood film types. He constructs a continuum of cinema-producing populations ranging from the small or local up to the very large and inclusive, including subcultural, accented, regional and national. Generally, the larger and more inclusive a cinema, the more “mainstream” or popular must be its aesthetic and subject matter. 36 musical strategies simultaneously situate musical use within the griot tradition of drawing attention to the narrator while also fulfilling the requirements of classical film scoring, as set out by Gorbman (1987)33 (Fisher 2011).
Third Cinema is a countercultural cinema pioneered in the 1960s by Latin American filmmakers in “an effort to invent a countercinema that would avoid the ideologies and industries of the dominant practice, in both its industrial and ideological power” (Slobin 2008: x-xvii; see Solanas and Getino 1997). This is in contrast to the First Cinema of Hollywood, with its polished production quality, political conservatism and formulaic story lines, satisfying the “commercial interests of the production groups” and working within a framework of bourgeois art treating the individual “as a passive and consuming object; rather than having his ability to make history recognized” (1997: 42). Applying the term to the South African industry forces one to reflect on the nature of South African film in a global perspective. The South African industry has largely aspired to the First Cinema model. The films discussed in Chapter 4 are probably the closest in conceptualization to the tenets of Third Cinema, though more ideologically than structurally; all are in their own ways against the alliance of white-controlled capital with film production practice, though they generally aspire to present their arguments through a First Cinema aesthetic framework.
Very few studies focus particularly on national film music. Mera and Burnand note “the vast majority of extant research has concentrated on a canon of Hollywood film music, composers and systems” (2006: 1), and also that
This overwhelming critical bias towards mainstream American filmmaking indicates that many of the assumptions and functional models on which film music studies have been based over the last twenty-five years are at best narrow and at worst misleading. (2006: 1)
In recent years, journals with an inclusive approach to content focussing on diverse geographical areas have begun to fill this gap, such as Music, Sound and the Moving Image,
33 See the section “Functions of film music” below, and in particular footnote 45. 37 though content from beyond the borders of Europe is still the exception. Other journals, such as the Journal of Film Music, include limited international content while maintaining a predominantly mainstream focus.
This section analyses the aims and methodologies of as broad a selection of relevant studies as possible. I group sources geographically, moving to some extent from west to east (geographically and culturally), moving through Europe, Australia (due to its cultural proximity to Europe), Bollywood, and finally the Soviet Union.34 I aim to contextualize South African film music in relation to these other industries, mapping overlapping concerns and recognizing structural similarities.
Britain Donnelly (2007) aims to counteract Park’s statement that “[t]he history of British cinema is one of unparalleled mediocrity” (2007: 1; original quotation from Park (1984: 13)). He talks of an “undiscovered history” of British film music that has only just begun to be explored (2007: 3). The rather general “aim of the book is to provide coverage of some of the rich, engaging and interesting films and music that have been produced by the British cinema” (2007: 13).
Donnelly recognizes that historically, Britain's foremost composers of concert music have been involved in the creation of film scores. In the South African context, such a trend is conspicuously absent. In the few cases where South African concert music composers have been involved in film scoring, the relationships are not sustained beyond one or two credits. Musicians involved in jazz (and, usually, other styles simultaneously—I discuss “musical itinerancy” below) have engaged more in sustained scoring work; Sam Sklair and Con Lamprecht, for instance, are rare examples of prolific South African film composers.35 Even Jonas Gwangwa, South Africa’s only academy award nomination for Best Original
34 I use the historical name because this is the focus of the source I refer to. 35 Sam Sklair’s sixteen feature film credits is unprecedented in the South African industry. Con Lamprecht is unusually prolific with his ten as well. This can be contrasted with the output of leading Hollywood composers such as Max Steiner and Hugo Friedhofer, whose scoring credits run into the hundreds. Figures are based on the artists’ composer credits on their individual IMDb pages. 38
Score,36 has not developed a sustained film scoring output. By contrast, Donnelly's description of the historical state of British film music could easily apply to the South African industry: “modest in sound and scale” (2007: 1), the part-time nature of musical employment, and the small music budgets available, while scholarship on the music in both industries has been negligible.
The part-time status of British film composers affected the nature of the film music they created. Most were engaged in creating music for a variety of other activities, including popular music and concert music. Both these types of music consequently had a strong influence on British film music, more so than in Hollywood, where professional film composers had essentially standardized film music (2007: 8). In this sense, the process of film music creation in the South African industry is closer to British practice than to Hollywood. South African film composers have tended to be itinerant, travelling from one musical role to another—film composer, jazz performer, orchestral conductor etc. This itinerancy has affected the nature of the film music produced—rather than a coherent body of standardized work played by contractually hired orchestras, the oeuvre is characterized by diversity through juxtaposition of styles, including African music, boeremusiek,37 jazz, popular musics, concert music (including light orchestral, serious orchestral and chamber), library versus original music etc.
Historically, American versus British scoring style is differentiated by contrast between the Americans’ highly-polished, moment-by-moment precise matching of music to visuals and the British writing of music without reference to a cut of the finished film, simply creating music appropriate in concept and atmosphere (Donnelly 2007: 1). Swynnoe (2002: 26) draws a broad generalization between American illustrative scoring practices and British atmospheric scoring practices. Illustrative scoring, relying heavily on the use of leitmotifs, follows the action on screen, from the presentation of place, to the appearance of or allusion
36 Co-nominated with George Fenton at the 1987 60th Academy Awards for both Best Original Score and Best Original Song for Cry Freedom (1987 dir. Richard Attenborough) (Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences 2014). 37 Afrikaner traditional music, typically involving some combination of concertina, guitar, banjo, accordion, piano, double bass or electric bass and mouth organ (Boeremusiek.org.za: no date). For a further discussion of the genre’s characteristics, and its relationship to other indigenous South African musics, see Martin (2013: 141-144). 39 to particular characters, all the way down to simulacrum of gesture or movement. This method introduces coherence between music and visuals, but also redundancy, since the score might simply reiterate visual information. Atmospheric scoring, by contrast, attempts to capture and enhance the expressive aspects of the visual element—in Ralph Vaughan Williams’ words (composer for Scott of the Antarctic (1948) and other films), the aim of this method is to “intensify the spirit of the whole” (quoted in Swynnoe 2002: 28). The drawback is that the link between music and visuals may be tenuous—too general and generic to capture nuance of meaning, or in extreme cases to be appropriate at all. Swynnoe sees illustrative versus atmospheric scoring as a distinction between “drama and diegesis”, the latter being the “inner core of the picture” and the former “its external trappings” (38). Saturating a score with musical illustrations of onscreen events supports the immediate physicality of events without supporting the overall narrative concept. Max Steiner’s score for The Informer (1935 dir. John Ford) exemplifies the latter, using such devices as a very brief upward glissando on a xylophone for a match being struck, or an upward glissando in the upper range of the harp for a cloud of cigarette smoke being exhaled, in the same film a few seconds later.
The scoring method found in British cinema has tended to predominate in the South African industry. Scoring precisely to picture in the pre-digital era required someone (in Hollywood, a dedicated music editor) to provide timings throughout the film so the composer can create synchronized music. The editor then prepared a copy of the film with punches and streamers38 to allow conductor and musicians to synchronize the recording to picture. In South Africa, while there are one or two productions from the 1960s where the score may have justified budget allocation for a music editor and for the extra recording time needed to achieve this sort of precision, it was certainly not the norm. An atmospheric
38 Punches and streamers are techniques used to assist conductors of film orchestras to synchronize musical timing with the timing of visual elements viewed on a large screen during recording.
Punches… are multiple marks electronically added to the video that produce a short sequence of fluttering light pulses on the screen. These serve as preparatory signals for the start of a music cue or as barline markers within a cue…. A streamer… is seen as a vertical line that moves across the film frame. This is a guide to help the conductor start a cue or sync a point within the cue (Karlin and Wright 2004: Timings and Clicks I, Free Timing, paragraph 5) 40 approach to scoring is economical in terms of both time and money, since from the musicians’ point of view the technical requirements of timing in relation to film become a non-issue. Hit points certainly occur occasionally, but the extended precision of the American approach is absent from the South African context.
National film music studies have demonstrated an interest in issues of identity and ethnicity more readily than mainstream film music studies. Donnelly (2007) devotes a chapter to the film Odd Man Out (1946), exploring how music is used to portray ethnicity, and how this portrayal says as much about the film's target audience as it does about the ethnicity of the characters. Cooper (2006) analyses Seán Ó Riada’s score for the documentary Mise Éire (1959 dir. George Morrison), documenting a portion of the history of Irish independence. Cooper’s approach (as well as Donnelly’s) is relevant to the South African context; he explores the score from a postcolonial perspective, analysing how Ó Riada incorporates Modernist orchestral elements and “traditional” Irish material, albeit still played by an orchestra. Cooper points out the different filmic associations between these two types of music: the former often accompanies depictions of violence, and is “associated with Ulster Unionism or British rule” (110). The latter accompanies depiction of the significant deeds of “the intellectual and literary leaders of the nationalist movement, and of the Gaelic League” (108).
Orchestral scoring, which has long formed the backbone of both American and British practice, is thus demonstrated to be a political act rather than a “neutral” expressive signifier. It remains the dominant musical language even in this film, but acquires an additional representative role, expressing colonial intrusion especially in its use of Modernist elements. In the South African context, orchestral film music is susceptible to interpretation on a number of levels. Specially composed orchestral music being rather rare in South African film, it transfers its signification onto the film object at large. It connotively signifies the quality of its accompanying film, worthy of a large scoring budget and the attention of a composer. Its rarity turns it into a statement, not just about the quality of the film, but about the quality of South Africa and its people. In this respect, it functions like all grandiose political symbols, using its display of grandeur as symbolic of the broader legitimacy of its political system. 41
One of the earliest national film music studies, Huntley (1972), tends towards a mixed-bag approach to research design. Huntley categorizes short sections variously by genre (“The Silent Film”, “The British Musical” etc.), historical periods (“The Years 1936-1939” etc.), reviews of individual films and biography. The arrangement of material is chronological, however, and the result is a year-by-year account of film music trends, selecting film- scoring highlights from each year or period and providing occasionally detailed accounts of scoring techniques in individual films. The style remains informal rather than academic, including anecdotes about unusual filming situations. Consistent with its time, the focus tends towards the autonomous rather than the contextual.
Continental Europe I have primarily based the sources in this section on individually authored articles from Mera and Burnand (2006). These cover issues of particular relevance to the South African industry, including the effects of filmic propaganda on the film industry, issues of social representation through diegetic/extra-diegetic narrative layering, and, more generally, an example of contemporary film music analysis as film analysis. An additional source discusses the use of pre-existing music and its relation to national identity, a key concept of Chapter 5 of my study.
Paxman (2006) studies the interaction of music and visuals in Krzystof Kieslowski’s Three Colours: Red (1993), scored by Zbigniew Preisner. Paxman’s aim is to explore the creation of new levels of meaning. He postulates that this creation takes place through a synergetic relationship between musical and visual elements (145)—levels of meaning that only one medium in isolation could not express (156). Such visual elements as light versus dark, characters depicted, colour symbolism, camera technique, scene changes and on-screen events are discussed in relation to musical elements such as instrumentation, harmony, scales, and perceived diegetic versus extra-diegetic use of music. Paxman’s analysis is part of the trend discussed under “Analysis of film music” where film music analysis is subsumed into film analysis. Paxman is required to make assumptions about the possible meanings of elements and their relationships to one another, including elements with very ambiguous relationships to signification, such as music and colour. The result is that his 42 conclusions are themselves very open to debate concerning his postulated synergistically created meanings.
Volker (2006) charts the path of film music in Germany from 1927 to 1945. Of particular relevance to the South African industry is Volker’s study of the types of pioneering German work of the early 1930s, when elements of both concert music and popular music were integrated into film, but which devolved into a vehicle of propaganda and “drifted quickly into mediocrity” (2006: 25). He explores the weakening of the industry through the exclusion of some of its central figures, many of whom emigrated and became renowned members of the Hollywood industry. Film as propaganda, intent on excluding its most talented practitioners based on political ideology, greatly undermined the potential of the South African industry; the limited protest genre films are the small compensation for this loss of a national film industry.
Dyer (2006) studies social functions of film music through analysis of Italian neo-realist cinema’s discrepancy between the ideology of “a movement presumed to be about creating a cinema genuinely expressive of ordinary people’s reality” and the practice of using extra- diegetic music drawn from the tradition of concert music, “from mid-romanticism to early modernism” (28). The use of folk song and popular music is restricted to diegetic use, rarely appearing in the extra-diegetic soundtrack. However, extra-diegetic music drawn from sources alien to the realities of the characters in the film runs the risk of occupying a “comfortable position of moral-political certainty outside the lives and situations of the films itself” (38). The diegetic/extra-diegetic, folk music/concert music divide Dyer notes here harks back to the technique of othering through narrative distancing discussed above in “Film music”. It is also relevant to the undiscriminating application of light orchestral library music that occurs in African Jim and many Afrikaans comedies of the 1950s particularly, implying Hollywood aspirations at the cost of local flavour. The opposite side of the coin to this argument is the potential for composers who incorporate folk or traditional musical elements into their music to fall foul of cultural imperialism and appropriation, or simply to provide a watered-down, kitsch version of the original.
Hillman (2005) studies the use of German classical music in films of the New German Cinema of the 1970s to 1980s, with the particular concern of studying the “reappraisal of 43 national identity issues” (23) after Nazi appropriation of this musical tradition. Hillman focusses on the use of pre-existing music, which acts as a special case when used as film music, since it comes with meaning attached, having acquired cultural meanings throughout its existence prior to its use in a film context. His interest is in the recent use of nineteenth-century music appropriated by the Nazis, which thus acquires an additional level of meaning beyond its original context, plus a further level of meaning through its re- use and re-interpretation in recent film. Chapter 5 analyses how musical examples and musical styles from multiple sources are re-harnessed and re-interpreted to the cause of Afrikaner nationalism, in a process whereby pre-existing meaning interacts with new contexts to establish new meaning.
Australia Coyle (2005) presents perhaps the fullest exploration of identity in relation to film music, covering representation of identity on multiple levels. Ethnic and racial identity, such as “Celtic”, European, Chinese-Australian, indigenous Australian, “whiteness” and multiculturalism; class identity, particularly working class; and sexual identity, particularly the musical depiction of masculinity, are all included. A section devoted to “Musical Sounds” approaches film music, sound effects and dialogue as closely interrelated, almost inseparable, elements (2005: 95), a trend not just in Australian film music but also in mainstream theory, as in Michel Chion’s thinking discussed under “Theory of film music”, and in line with Paxman’s (2006) study of Three Colours: Red discussed above.
Coyle explores the link between film music tracks and their relationship to contemporary concepts of cultural identities (1). This aim is based on a feature of Australia’s social landscape similar to South Africa’s: its social demographic is highly diverse, consisting of not just an indigenous population but also a colonial population derived from a variety of nationalities. The question of “national identity” in Australia is thus a complex one, as in South Africa, where our primary unifying concepts as a nation are “unity in diversity” and the “rainbow nation”. Expressions of national identity need to deal with the question of diversity, and with political and politically correct elements of the issue. Coyle’s analysis of national identity and the obligations it inspires (or otherwise) in artists has relevance to the South African context: 44
There is a conflation of the argument for protection of local cultural products and industries… with expectations for a set of national sounds, images and coherent “identity”…. But preserving media industries in a local context does not mean that local artists can be assumed to bear the responsibility for a particular set of myths and meanings related to a generalized idea of “Australia”. (11)
Bollywood39 Morcom's (2007) analysis of the presence of Western influence in Bollywood underscore has implications for South African film music. She investigates why, in a culture with a strong classical and theoretical music tradition of its own, Bollywood underscore commonly makes use of Western, particularly Hollywood, symphonic traditions of underscoring. She concludes that although Indian classical music was used extensively in the past in dramatic contexts to express a wide range of emotions of all sorts, more recently its focus has been only on positive emotion: practitioners of the rāg system describe their function as “to give happiness and good feeling”, avoiding negative emotion (174).
Film, by contrast, like all forms of theatre, expresses a wide range of emotion, both positive and negative. Western classical music, and more particularly Hollywood-style film scoring, has already developed an extensive system of musical signs particularly appropriate to the dramatic requirements of Western narrative forms, linked to a narrative tendency of beginning, middle and end, and thus in conjunction with Hindi scoring traditions provides a very wide palette of scoring possibilities. In addition, Western concert music (and film music derived from it) is fundamentally designed around the notion of progression—forward motion, development and change, and as such is particularly suited
39 Unlike other national (or in this case regional) film industries, Bollywood film music has been the subject of numerous studies. Discussion of multiple sources is beyond the scope of this study. Examples include Ranade (2006) and Booth (2008). Ranade, like Morcom (2007), discusses the Hindi film song, a genre that falls somewhere between popular songs and film music itself: partly freestanding pop song, capable of an existence detached from its original filmic context, and partly influenced by and interacting with that context. Songs, Morcom points out, are closely integrated into and adapted to the scene, narrative and characters, rather than being independent musical statements (240). Booth (2008) explores the professional working environment of Bollywood in relation to the characteristic sound of Bollywood orchestras (86-7), charting the relationship between the “Bollywood sound” and the industrial and cultural context in which it was created (100). 45 towards interaction with the strong narrative thrust of film. This is in contrast to Indian music, where the design, through the use of particular rāgs that embody particular aesthetic categories, tends to lean more towards stasis (Morcom 2007: 159).
There is less mystery as to why South African film directors and composers would want to use Western film-scoring conventions, given the strong Western influence of the industry and its practitioners. The industries of the two countries whose films were most widely distributed in South Africa, namely the USA and Great Britain, have inevitably influenced the South African film industry. Gutsche (1972) and Tomaselli (1988) have documented the saturation of the South African market with films from these two industries. It is not surprising then that aspects of the production style of South African film owe much to these two industries. From De Voortrekkers (1916 dir. Harold Shaw, also from Hollywood), indebted to The Birth of a Nation (1915 dir. D.W. Griffith), to The Second Sin (1966 dir. David Millin), with its Hitchcockian influence,40 narrative frameworks have been imported from these other industries into South African productions.
However, the question remains as to why it is necessary, in a country with a rich variety of musical traditions, to use the film-scoring conventions of other countries. Most obviously, this preference was political, the expected choice in a society enamoured with European- derived culture. Another argument, supported by Kevin Volans’s interpretation of certain examples of African music, would posit that African music is frequently non-narrative in structure, aiming towards stasis and the creation and sustaining of atmosphere rather than narrative progression and change, much as Morcom (2007) claims of Indian music. Volans describes what he came to think of as an African conception of time and space, different from the European conception:
I suddenly found a music which had no concept or perception— percept—perception of proportion.... which means no sense of form. It’s a series of images. (Volans, quoted in Taylor 1993: 23)
40 This influence extends as far as a narrative climax in which an important character falls to his death. Meghanking (2014) discusses six films from Alfred Hitchcock’s oeuvre in which this device appears. 46
This preference towards stasis would suggest filmmakers are more likely to use African music colouristically, for the creation of atmosphere and for signification of place rather than for structural narrative accompaniment. Examples of scoring with African music are rare,41 so this argument is difficult to test. In the second half of Chapter 3, however, I analyse issues of representation within the few South African films that have used African music as the basis of their extra-diegetic underscore.
This colouristic versus narrativistic approach is explicitly followed in the Hollywood model. Karlin and Wright (2004) quote film composer Thomas Newman discussing his music for the film Road to Perdition (2002 dir. Sam Mendes), a film about an Irish- American hitman. Newman discusses the inclusion of Irish influence in the score, and notes, “then it just kind of drifted into a dramatic sensibility as opposed to an ethnic one” (85). This dichotomy of “dramatic” versus “ethnic” is problematic in its implication that “ethnic” music, in other words non-Western music, is incapable of being dramatic—as if all non-Western musicians ever attempt to create is a particular sense of colour. Such an attitude stems from a lack of insight into how to interpret musical expression in the particular cultural context. Karlin and Wright also quote composer Charles Bernstein discussing Sadat (1983 dir. Richard Michaels). Bernstein notes, “that was pretty much the decision about the score: to do it in a neutral idiom and use colorations—accents” (85). The idiom is only neutral from a Western perspective, to ears trained in the conventions of Western musical interpretative practices. Any culture would consider its own music to be neutral.42 The “neutral-dramatic” versus “ethnic-colour” dichotomy stems from a failure to see Western music in a realistic cultural context, based on an ingrained conviction that it is in some way fundamental, compared to the bizarrity or primitivity of other cultures’
41 I make this statement specifically with regard to South African film. 42 My interpretation of Bernstein’s use of “neutral” is not that the music in question is expressively neutral, signifying nothing, but rather that it is normalized in the context within which it occurs— “normal music” from the point of view of the listeners. So, a repertory of music may be idiomatically familiar, or neutral, to a particular audience, while still including expressive signifiers conveying meaning to that audience, such as signifiers of national identity. A national anthem, for instance, is likely to be written in an idiom “neutral” to at least some of the citizens of the country, while still potentially engendering feelings of national pride within those citizens.
47 musics. This terminology appears to be standard in Hollywood. Even South African export Mark Kilian, composer for Tsotsi (2005), uses this terminology (see Hoover 2009).
The Soviet Union Egorova (1997) tends to deal with the subject of Soviet film music with almost no reference to scoring trends outside the Soviet Union. This is in a way appropriate to the study of Soviet film, given its enforced isolation from international trends. However, it has much in common with the history of film music in the United States and other countries.
The early history of Soviet film music as Egorova documents it is strikingly similar to its history in the United States, yet she draws no parallel between the two. The progression from piano to orchestra in the accompaniment of silent film; the simultaneous related progression from improvisation to cue books to specifically-composed scores; as well as features such as the divergence of scoring techniques into score-based symphonic music versus song-based popular music, are noted, but not contrasted with similar developments in the United States and elsewhere. This insular approach is reflected in the cited sources, which do not reference Western literature beyond an acknowledged debt to the theoretical framework of Huntley (1972), a mention of two other European books and a brief mention of Karlheinz Stockhausen’s work Kurzwellen (1967). The structure is also unconventional, containing a short, summarizing preface in place of an introduction, and no bibliography.
Beyond the subtitle of the book, namely “an historical survey”, no further aim is explicitly stated, leaving the reader to extract general themes from the large number of short chapters presented, covering the entire Soviet era from the October Revolution of 1917 to its collapse in 1991. The focus of the chapters varies between general historical trends and analyses of particular film scores.
Theoretical relevance of national film music studies It is apparent that, unique as the South African industry is because of its particular political and social environment, it nevertheless shares many features with other national industries, both historical and contemporary. Belonging in a colonial melting pot, South Africa’s industry shares with Australia’s an obsession with racial, social and national identities. Having developed in a dictatorship, the industry also shares with Nazi Germany problems 48 associated with censorship and with the exclusion of many of its most promising practitioners based on racial ideology. Exhibiting a strongly Eurocentric preference, it shares with Bollywood a side-lining of its own musical practices in favour of Western trends, and as with the practices of Italian neo-realism, it exhibits tension between the range of musical styles at its disposal and how those styles are harnessed to represent South African identities. Having compromised itself to appease the political forces that aimed to censor it, it must now face a similar charge to that levelled at the British industry—that it is of “unparalleled mediocrity” (Park 1984: 13), and “modest in sound and scale” (Donnelly 2007: 1). It must also examine the ways in which its scoring is, like the British scoring of Irish material, a political act rather than mere entertainment. Like the Soviet Union, it has been remarkably isolationist, though has largely failed to produce original practitioners of the likes of Sergei Eisenstein and Sergei Prokofiev.
Mainstream film music studies Although many, even recent, sources on film music claim that the topic has been neglected by film studies in general, there is in fact a sizeable body of literature available, running to nearly three-hundred books in the English language alone that specifically deal with film music, supported by a number of specialist journals and an extensive array of articles. Most of this material however dates from the early 1990s and later, with considerably fewer titles prior to this, as shown in Figure 4. Perhaps because of the lack of attention film music studies has gained from musicologists and film studies scholars, others have stepped in to fill the gap from an array of different academic fields: marketing (Holbrook 2011), literature and popular culture (Scheurer 2008), theology (Callaway 2013), English (Kalinak 1992), comparative literature (Gorbman 1987) etc. 49
20
18
16
14
12
10
8
6
4
2
0 1925 1935 1945 1955 1965 1975 1985 1995 2005 2015
Figure 4: Number of film music books published per year
In previously colonized parts of the world, where postcolonial and decolonial studies have assumed an important role in contributing to the creation of identities after colonial rule, representation is a conceptual framework that arises almost inevitably out of social diversity and issues of who is permitted to represent whom. It serves as a means of reinterpreting material that made implicit or explicit assumptions about the status and relative importance of the various social groups constituting the society in which the work was produced. Film music studies, however, is a field that has mostly developed in the parts of the Western world that have established commercial film industries, particularly the USA and Europe. These societies have a predominating monoculture,43 and often have a stake in not appreciating the extent to which their forms of knowledge are relative and
43 But see Saffle (2003), who attempts to unpack this monoculture into its component multicultural elements expressed film-musically as cultural topoi. Kassabian (2001: 12) clarifies how it is that many cultures sum to a monoculture:
As part of the liberal discourse of the nation, the category of “American” claims to include all axes of identity. As part of the mass culture discourse of Hollywood, however, “American” is established negatively precisely as excluding those identities the nation’s liberal discourse claims to include. 50 particular to a certain worldview; as such, they have a limited capacity for appreciating the centrality of representation in relation to race and culture. In such cultures whiteness, white superiority and white privilege predominantly remain unquestioned and invisible; they take the normativity of white viewpoints for granted. Models of film music have been steeped in this worldview, and have thus tended to focus on technical classification of the functions and expressive palette of a body of film that is itself overwhelmingly monocultural. Due to the homogeneity of the sample set under review, such models have tended to overlook racial and social representative facets of film music.
Internationally, then, scholarship on identity in film music is limited. Most texts focussing on this issue primarily address representation of Native Americans in the genre of the western; very little literature has penetrated other genres. Various approaches to the topic are addressed by Kalinak (2012), Burnand and Sarnaker (1999), Donnelly (2005: 55-87), Pisani (2005) and Gorbman (2000). A small body of scholarship exists on African Americans in Hollywood, including Doughty (2009) and Stanfield (2005). Kassabian (2001) offers an extended treatment of identity in mainstream film music, demonstrating how the representation of racial (particularly African American), sexual and national identity are all interlinked. Donnelly (2007) devotes a chapter to the representation of Irish ethnicity, a topic covered also by Cooper (2006). Another interesting example is Summers (2013), who focusses on identity expressed through film music, though in relation to fictional Others, through an analysis of the music used to represent aliens across the Star Trek franchise.
A text that aims for a global view, incorporating analysis of films across a swathe of mainstream and regional output, is Slobin (2008). Slobin introduces the concept of the “superculture”, a term that refers to
the dominant, mainstream musical content of a society, in effect, everything people take for granted as being ‘normal,’ such as the singing of the ‘Star-Spangled Banner’ at sports events; … the canon of popular music; … the idea that country music is more patriotic than city music; and so on. (2008: 3) 51
Slobin points out that film music is itself such a supercultural force, having developed into a series of conventions and accepted practices during the studio era. These conventions are not “neutral”, or purely technical—they have ethnographic, or ethnomusicological, implications, in that they follow standardized approaches to the characterization of ethnic groups. Slobin introduces terminology to categorize the ways in which music is applied, or not applied, to characters whose ethnicity is other than white, native English speaker. These include “erasure” (23), when an ethnic group is denied film musical accompaniment; “displacement”, and the related “replacement” (24), when music from one cultural and/or geographic location is “displaced” to another location, usually “replacing” the music of the culture that inhabited that location.
In the South African context, this concept of the superculture and its related terminology has resonances in the early colonial and nationalist films I address in Chapter 3, where displacement/replacement is a central practice in the scoring of indigenous ethnic groups. Erasure becomes a primary technique in certain genres of Afrikaner nationalist film, particularly urban comedy. Certain products, particularly those films discussed in the second half of Chapter 3 and the later films from Chapter 4, are successful to varying degrees in breaking free of these supercultural scoring practices, finding new approaches to scoring that are better able to approach critical questions regarding issues of land and ethnicity, issues the supercultural model lacks the tools to adequately address.
Theory of film music Functions of film music Later authors have frequently treated Gorbman (1987) as a seminal film music studies text. This is fair, given the pioneering nature of the study, though Gorbman established certain axioms that other authors have accepted without sufficient critical engagement. One such axiom is that the underlying functions of film music are comparable to those of background music: “neither is designed to be closely listened to”, and “primary among its goals… is to render the individual an untroublesome viewing subject: less critical, less ‘awake’” (5).
This can be true, but takes film music at its most prosaic and draws inferences about the function of all film music—akin to hearing poor-quality concert music, and inferring that the function of all concert music is to provide monotonous material for audience members 52 to sleep to. Gorbman neglects to factor in the changing functions of film music in different narrative situations. There are situations in which film music aims to provide barely noticeable support; but other situations foreground film music, elevating its importance even above visual material. Foregrounded film music is most certainly designed to be heard. Two of many possible proofs of this are Howard Shore’s score to The Lord of the Rings and John Williams’s scores to Star Wars and Harry Potter, for example. The central musical themes of these films characterize the films themselves. They provide a sonic signature that captures and amplifies the expressive essence of a film. The claim that film music aims to make viewers “less critical” and “less ‘awake’” could be levelled at many aspects of the production process, the purposes of which are to encourage suspension of disbelief. Omitting costumes and makeup would make viewers more critical and more awake; so would omitting camera techniques such as close-ups, which encourage the viewer’s emotional engagement with the characters; any art form uses the means at its disposal to encourage the interest and involvement of its audience.
One could argue the main themes are the only memorable parts of film music. In terms of musical architecture, however, the same is true of any piece of music, regardless of genre. The themes are always, by definition, the most memorable part. When listening to a popular concert music work such as Mozart’s Symphony No.40 in g minor, the casual listener may be just as likely, following the opening material, to drift into the same oblivion Gorbman considers the default reception mode of film music.
Brown (1994: 32) offers a quite different model of film/musical interaction in his interpretation of the relationship between visuals and music in Psycho (1960 dir. Alfred Hitchcock). Contrary to Gorbman’s reading of film music as aural opium for the listener, Brown notes how a strongly individualistic score can function in a dialectical relationship to the narrative, generating a new layer of meaning:
… the degree to which Hitchcock’s and Herrmann’s respective arts do not merge within the surface narrative is the degree to which their dialectical, nonmerged interaction can actually enhance the aesthetic impact of each separate art while also encouraging a filmic reading that escapes the traps set by cultural or bourgeois myth. 53
Gorbman’s tendency to arrive at universal principles from insufficiently diverse sample sets gives rise to other problematic and overly general approaches to musical concepts. Gorbman asks, “What is the nature of musical pleasure?”, but provides only a paragraph- long, Freudian answer. Her definition of music as “the conscious organization of sounds into harmony and melody” (6) evidences the same lack of rigour, inapplicable to most conceptions of music beyond four-part harmony.
There is another angle to Gorbman’s correlation of background music and film music, not explicitly stated by her: both are forms of music that the listener does not voluntarily choose. They happen to, rather than being the conscious choice of, the listener. This increases their subversive power, in that the listener is not selecting the type of musical expression influencing them. In the case of film music, the listener is at least consciously entering a space where they know there is a good chance they will hear some music that will have a particular, though at this stage unknown, emotional effect. This is true to an extent of background music as well, insofar as one can expect to hear it in shopping malls, dentists’ offices etc.
In films, although it is true that “film and television music is all-pervading and aims to control the audience in its psychological processes” (Donnelly 2005: 2), it also functions as assistive technology in that it helps the audience achieve a common and essential goal in coming to the cinema, namely to escape into a fantasy world—at least in the case of most mainstream, fictional fare. Background music in retail environments lacks this assistive quality, in that its goal is to manipulate the listener to an end that may not be to their advantage, such as purchasing more freely. Background music in situations such as dentists’ offices can as easily be irritating as soothing, which is much less often the case with film music: manipulative as it may be, it is rarely likely to be actively irritating, except as a result of factors external to the film’s actual characteristics, such as excessive amplitude level of the theatre’s sound system. Experiencing film music therefore involves a willingness to be manipulated. Experiencing background music as an unrequested accompaniment to our everyday, real existence involves manipulation against our will. Our knowledge, conscious or unconscious, of the music’s ulterior motives can counteract its supposed abilities to relax us and make us more amenable to spending, resulting in our 54 irritation with it. Whether or not we are amenable to the music therefore depends on whether we are trying to escape reality or function within it.
In addition to Gorbman (1987), a small number of seminal texts form the foundation of film music theory, with later scholars extensively referring to these texts. These are, in chronological order, Adorno and Eisler (1994, first published 1947), Kalinak (1992), Brown (1994) and Chion (1994). Chion’s focus is primarily on sound, as an early proponent of the treatment of all elements of the “soundtrack”,44 namely dialogue, sound
44 Chion however denies that the “soundtrack” as a single entity exists: sound relates much more strongly to the visuals it accompanies at any given point than to other sounds in a linear arrangement:
By stating that there is no soundtrack I mean first of all that the sounds of a film, taken separately from the image, do not form an internally coherent entity on equal footing with the image track. Second, I mean that each audio element enters into simultaneous vertical relationship with narrative elements contained in the image (characters, actions) and visual elements of texture and setting. These relationships are much more direct and salient than any relations the audio element could have with other sounds. (1994: 40)
It is not clear how Chion would account for the efforts of composers and sound designers to create large-scale horizontal relationships specifically aimed at the creation of a coherent “soundtrack”, such as leitmotivic use and the use of a repertoire of sounds or noises that relate to each other in some way. The sound design of the original Star Wars films is a case in point, where the sound world created is as distinctive as the visual world. Chion continues:
In the simplest and strongest relation, that of offscreen sound, the confrontation of sound with image establishes the sound as being offscreen, even as this sound is heard coming from the surface of the screen. Take away the image, and the offscreen sounds that were perceived apart from other sounds, purely by virtue of the visual exclusion of their source, become just like the others. The audiovisual structure collapses, and the sounds make a completely new one together. A film deprived of its image and transformed into an audio track proves altogether strange—provided you listen and refrain from imposing the images from your memory onto the sounds you hear. Only at this point can we talk about a soundtrack. (40)
Chion’s apparent statement that the difference between offscreen and onscreen sound is dictated purely by the image is in most cases not accurate: placement of sound in relation to image can be physically manipulated through proximity to the microphone, amplitude level, panning, and reverberation quality and level. In a stereo soundtrack, then, not to mention surround sound, sound has a geographical proximity configurable entirely separately from the image track, and which perceptually extends beyond the borders of the image frame. 55 effects and music, as an interactive whole, an approach which has recently become very influential, as for instance in Harper, Doughty and Eisentraut (2009) and Buhler, Neumeyer and Deemer (2010).
Film music texts often set out their own lists of the types of roles music tends to play in a filmic setting, a practice one can find as early as Copland (1939). Gorbman’s “seven scoring principles” (1987: 73) have been particularly influential.45 While these principles are valuable, there are certain features that, nearly thirty years on, deserve constructive review. Firstly, the list includes different categories of information. Points I, II and VII are indeed principles to be followed if one wished to recreate a “classical” film score. Points III, IV, V and VI are functions of film music: they refer to the effect the music achieves rather than compositional principles. Secondly, point IV covers a broad range of functions, from formal structure to characterization to musical expression. Gorbman thus spreads issues of the relationship between music and form between points IV, V and VI.
Figure 5 presents an updated interpretation of film musical functions, based on Prendergast (1992), Davis (1999) and my personal experience of the subject.
45 These principles are worth repeating here as Gorbman presents them, as they serve as the theoretical basis for many studies of film music: I. Invisibility: The technical apparatus of nondiegetic music must not be visible. II. “Inaudibility”: Music is not meant to be heard consciously. As such it should subordinate itself to dialogue, to visuals—i.e., to the primary vehicles of the narrative. III. Signifier of emotion: Soundtrack music may set specific moods and emphasize particular emotions suggested in the narrative (cf. #IV), but first and foremost, it is a signifier of emotion itself. IV. Narrative cueing: a. Referential/narrative: music gives referential and narrative cues, e.g., indicating point of view, supplying formal demarcations, and establishing setting and characters. b. Connotative: music “interprets” and “illustrates” narrative events. V. Continuity: Music provides form and rhythmic continuity—between shots, in transitions between scenes, by filling “gaps.” VI. Unity: Via repetition and variation of musical material and instrumentation, music aids in the construction of formal and narrative unity. VII. A given film score may violate any of the principles above, providing the violation is at the service of the other principles. 56
Figure 5: Functions of film music
“Transcendency” of film music and the exchange of film-musical meaning Some authors have taken a spiritualist, Romantic approach to film music, arguing for its ineffable meaning in a similar vein to nineteenth-century Romantic interpretations of music. Donnelly (2005: 37) argues, “just as [religious] music is usually awe-inspiring and provides a bond to the spiritual, the emotional potency of film music offers something of a portal to the transcendent and experience beyond the everyday.” For Callaway (2013: 171- 2), “music is often called upon to signify a pervasive presence that cannot be contained in the image”, and, “as it fills the film’s spiritual ‘gaps’, music exists in a realm of mystery, bearing a depth of meaning that resists analysis”. As suggested by the title of Donnelly’s book, The spectre of sound, Donnelly theorizes film-musical metaphors of ghostliness. These range from the “otherworldly” (because unsensed and unknown from within the diegesis) nature of film music, to the “ghostly” traces of an unheard, missing score, such as the unused score for The Shining written by Wendy Carlos (53). In Chapter 3, in relation to the film The Jackals, I extend this “ghostly” metaphor to a postcolonial reading of film music as signifier of displaced peoples. 57
Donnelly’s metaphors extend to the under-explored topic of the effect film has on music, rather than the more common discussion of the effect of music on film. In relation to the use of sections of Bartók’s Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta in The Shining, Donnelly points out that the use of pre-existing music can effectively extend the boundaries of a film beyond its typical constraints, expanding its domain of meaning through re- interpreting the pre-existing music as a part of its whole. Thus, Music for Strings, Percussion and Celesta becomes, forever more, an “outpost” of The Shining, having acquired meaning from its filmic association:
[T]he remaining parts of this music are not really alien to the film, but implicated through ghostly ephemeral connections, adumbrating a larger notion of The Shining that spills off the screen and cinema space, and into wider culture most strongly through its use of existing, recontextualized music. (41-42)
Donnelly’s model of two-way meaning is a useful conceptualization regarding my approach to the musical representation of nationalism in Chapter 5, where I demonstrate how musical material from a variety of sources unrelated to nationalist ideologies is repurposed in a South African filmic context. While music can “nationalize” other elements of the narrative, these elements are also able to “nationalize” music.
Character, race and ethnicity in film music Film’s approach to race, especially but not exclusively in the case of mainstream commercial film, is problematic in that it is usually conducted from an “outside looking in” point of view. Specifically in the case of film music, mainstream film has developed a complex set of codes for representing a wide range of expressive states based on characterization, ambience and genre. Audiences are so familiar with this set of codes that they can appear to be neutral and natural. The complex system of codes is reserved, however, for capturing the emotional nuances of Western, typically white, characters. Characters outside this specific group tend to be defined in much more general terms: not as individual people capable of experiencing individual emotions, but as representatives of their national or ethnic group, or of the geographic location associated with that group. The extent to which film can musically characterize figures outside Western society depends 58 partly on how detailed the filmic representation of such characters is in a given situation. Given a sufficiently nuanced character, the score may treat them according to the standard codes of musical expressive representation, possibly with some elements of local colour added through instrumentation or a scale commonly associated with the culture in question.46 More typically, representation will be more along of the lines of Donnelly’s description of the music for the British film Odd Man Out, set in Northern Ireland: “the music in Odd Man Out works as a frame for British audiences, a marker for a particular point of view, allowing easy entry to a world of cliché and formula” (2005: 65).
Lack of familiarity with the culture’s own musical language presents a barrier on two levels. Firstly, the composer will likely lack detailed knowledge of the culture. Secondly, the audience will similarly lack such knowledge. Since Hollywood film has always aimed for what Bordwell, Staiger and Thompson (1985: 3) characterize as an “excessively obvious cinema”, the risk of alienating the audience, and thereby jeopardizing box office returns, through musical language consisting of signifiers uninterpretable to the target audience, is not an option. The result is that, unless the “ethnic Other” has been sufficiently individualized and humanized that Western audiences can accept that character as possessing a similar gamut of emotions to themselves, typical approaches to musical emotional characterization will seem inappropriate to that audience. Further, it will rob audiences of the pleasure of vicariously experiencing exotic people and locales, an important part of the mainstream cinema phenomenon.
Of particular relevance to the South African context of musical representation of race and ethnicity is Donnelly’s comment on the portrayal of black Americans in the Western genre: “Bearing some similarities with the representation of Irish people, black Americans have been associated with a musicalized representation, manifesting something of a non-verbal but singing and dancing Other” (2005:77). It will become apparent in Chapter 3 and Chapter 4 in the discussion of representation of black South Africans that this concept of the “singing and dancing Other” is as prevalent in South African film.
46 See for instance Gorbman (2000: 241), who discusses Hugo Friedhofer’s treatment of Native Americans along these lines in the score to Broken Arrow (1950 dir. Delmer Daves). 59
Characterization is a central part of what film music does; it is surprising then that the terminology does not seem to exist to centralize characterization as a tool for interpreting film scores. Recognized genres exist for other media devoted primarily to characterization on an extended scale, notably the biography and biopic. Extended characterization through musical means appears to be a concept without a concise term, however. Yet, in the context of film, the narrative development of individual characters frequently takes place through musical means. Acknowledging the centrality of this interpretation results in the novel conceptualization of a film score as a series of overlapping and interlocking “musical biographies” of individual characters or groups. Taking any one character, one can observe the totality of musical statements made about that character over the course of the film and chart the development (or otherwise) of the individual’s characterization through music. This approach encourages multiple concurrent horizontal readings over isolated or vertical situational readings as theorized by Chion (1994: 40). The best term for this concept would seem to be “bioscore”,47 and its verb form “bioscoring”.
The reason such a concept lacks nomenclature may be due to the relatively recent shift in attitude that has resulted in the recognition of the film score as fundamental to meaning, generating it rather than merely supporting it. Film music does not simply redundantly accompany visual meaning: often if the music were not there, the meaning of the visuals would be entirely ambiguous. This realization enables one to conceptualize film scoring as a creator of meaning, which means that it is frequently the primary source of meaning, and is thus the primary, not secondary, agent responsible for characterization.
Bioscoring may appear to be similar in concept to the development of a Wagnerian-style leitmotif over time; the concept I am proposing, however, works on a more comprehensive level, of which leitmotivic composition is one of a number of aspects. Leitmotivic composition is as much concerned with musical development, dramatic development and structural unity as it is with characterization. Characterization is its initial goal—a character’s leitmotif in its original form aims to provide specific information about
47 This term is already in use in certain scientific contexts, including environmental conservation and microbiology, but the fields are sufficiently distant in focus from film music studies that confusion is unlikely to arise. 60 personality. The development of the motif is not a development of character, however, but a narrative development through which the characters progress. The assignation of leitmotifs even has the opposite effect to character development—it concretizes the character from the outset. Structural unity and narrative development rely on reference to a fundamentally unchanging central point, this point being the leitmotif representing the character. If the composer develops the leitmotif past the point of recognition in relation to its original form, the initial benefits of the technique will be lost. One is then moving into the realm of Arnold Schoenberg’s concept of developing variation, which is far more concerned with processes of musical development than narrative structure. Leitmotivic composition is thus an ideal model for the likes of Wagner’s Ring Cycle, where from the outset a foregone conclusion is announced based on the actions taken by Wotan and Alberich. The characters are slaves to the fatalistic design of the whole—they are not intended to develop because they are trapped in the consequences of their own actions. Their inability to change is central to the drama, which unfolds as a series of events played off against the very particular nature of each character.
A bioscore may contain leitmotivic material then, but it may also contain various other types of material that do not fit into a conventional framework of a unified motivic structure. It consists of all musical elements that play a part in the characterization of one entity, whether that is a character, an item, a place, a concept etc. It is fundamental to the analysis of the musical representation of such an entity across duration, whether that is one scene, one film or a body of films, and across time, where duration refers to film length as an absolute, and time to real world chronology.
Analysis of film music Analyses of film music range in scope from entire genres, such as horrors,48 Westerns,49 or combat films,50 to individual directors’ oeuvres,51 to individual films.52 In this section, I will problematize certain approaches to analysis that have become standard practice since
48 See for instance Lerner (2010). 49 See for instance Kalinak (2012). 50 See for instance O’Brien (2012). 51 See for instance Bodde (2002) and Gengaro (2013) 52 See for instance Paulus (2009) and Reyland (2012) 61 their introduction by influential writers such as Kalinak and Gorbman.
Film music and music analysis A problem apparent in some of the literature on film music is that music-analytical training is not within the scope of those who have written and enacted the theory.53 Descriptions of music in relation to other narrative elements are as a result often relatively perceptive but lacking in analytical rigour or the ability to synthesize descriptions of musical practice into higher levels of abstraction. This results in lengthy and sometimes inaccurate descriptions of individual orchestral passages, assigning agency and meaning to individual instruments but failing to produce a narrative that is capable of discerning wider patterns in the creation of musical meaning.
Kalinak (1992) demonstrates some of these problems. She opts for textual analysis, supported by occasional musical examples. Her analyses principally concern themselves with the interaction between score and narrative: she recognizes a selection of themes or leitmotifs, and documents the interaction of these with the narrative. Her textual, descriptive approach results in cumbersome and lengthy analyses. Occasionally the analyses of musical events are problematic, as with the discussion of the “Imperial March” theme from Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back (1980 dir. Irvin Kershner). Kalinak makes much of the supposed minor/major ambiguity she identifies in the theme, going so far as to describe it as bitonal (195). In fact, the theme falls simply and unambiguously into g minor, the harmony of the first two bars of the melody alternating between i and ♭vi. While ♭vi is chromatic to the key, it is not an example of bitonality, which requires the simultaneous or vertical occurrence of two distinct chords, rather than the horizontal alternation between those chords. Kalinak’s mistake is to consider the entire first two bars as belonging to a single chord—in what key she does not specify. The introductory material preceding the entrance of the melody, although monophonic, makes
53 For example, Gorbman (1987), Kalinak (1992) and O’Brien (2012). The first two are discussed below. O’Brien works within the framework of musical function laid out by Gorbman, though his focus is more specific than hers. O’Brien looks purely at the genre of the combat film, though this choice is really a means to the end of the actual focus of the study, which is the portrayal of masculinity through film music. A lack of contextualization through limited reference to contemporary sources on film music studies weakens O’Brien’s approach, however. 62 it clear, through its focus on the pitch g and inclusion of an f♯, that the key is g minor. A rather careless approach to descriptions of the internal relationships of musical material persists in later writing, such as Kalinak (2010: 49). Here she states that Erik Satie’s accompaniment to the opening section of Entr’acte (1924 dir. Rene Clair) “seems to move from the unrelated keys of A major to F major to C major in the opening section”. C major and F major, being in a dominant-to-tonic or tonic-to-subdominant relationship to one another, are by definition as closely related as two keys can be. The key of A major stands in tertiary relation to both keys—not as closely related, but still very comfortably within the confines of conventional harmonic relations. To call any two keys “unrelated” in the first place is meaningless, as even the most distantly related keys54 still evince a particular relationship to one another.
There was, in the beginning years of the current boom in film music scholarship, circa early 1990s, a particular tendency for scholars from other fields to approach film music studies in quite conventional ways, and in the process to disparage musicological understandings of music. Chion (1994: 187) for instance talks about “ways to classify sound through new descriptive criteria that lie outside the narrow field of traditional musicological studies”. Although his theory does indeed demonstrate insightful approaches to the relation of sound and film, he demonstrates no familiarity with musicological studies traditional or otherwise. The example analyses that end the study are not far away from the type of formalist critique that musicologists were during this time criticized for enacting, for instance by Kalinak (1992: 32). Music analysts, on the other hand, had developed highly refined approaches to analysis almost entirely ignored by these theorists, even when they do indeed provide space for interpretive, critical, contextual approaches to music, as, for instance, Nattiez’s (1990) theory of musical semiotics.
Kalinak (2010: 22) still sees film music as purely a matter of critical theory culled entirely from other fields:
54 Judged by physical distance from one another, the most distantly related keys are those, both major or both minor, in an augmented 4th/diminished 5th relationship to one another. Judged by lack of shared pitches, the most distantly related keys are those, both major or both minor, in a semitone relationship to one another. 63
A lively theoretical discourse has grown up around the sources of film’s powers and pleasures, and the ways in which they are tied to the presence of music in film. Incorporating the insights of structural linguistics, psychoanalysis, Marxism, cultural studies, and cognitive theory, theorists of film music have investigated why music is such a potent force in film… and what we get out of listening to it.
Naturally musicology is itself influenced by all these theoretical approaches; but conspicuously absent from this list is music analysis. The issue with analysis arose from a perceived schism between readings of music as cultural text and music as “autonomous object”, although this term is misleading in that it fails to take into account the inherent diachronically intertextual approach of music analysis even when it is not specifically treating music as a cultural object.55
No one today would deny the value of cultural readings of music, but training in music analysis allows one also to fully appreciate “autonomous” musical meaning. The two are largely different, and complementary, forms of knowledge, neither able to provide a “complete” picture of musical meaning alone. But the glib analysis Kalinak provides of the “Imperial March” makes it clear that such analysis is a specialized skill, requiring theoretical knowledge and experience of the workings of musical material. Musicologists and music analysts specifically could therefore understandably have been reluctant to abandon this particular form of musical meaning, because it offers insights into the abstract nature of musical material not available through cultural theoretical readings. Such readings remain of crucial importance for creators of music, at least those capable of transcending the raw theory to create a work of human and cultural relevance.
Examples of the form of textual, descriptive analysis enacted by Gorbman and Kalinak continue today, as for instance in Rothbart (2013). Gorbman and Rothbart both advocate the necessity of complete analyses of individual film scores. Gorbman puts this into practice with the score of the French film Zéro de Conduite (1933 dir. Jean Vigo).56 The
55 Even in “autonomous” analyses, the score is still understood in its historical relationship to other scores. The result is that history and geography are typically embedded into formal analyses, as particular historical treatments of material are tied to particular locations. 56 The analysis partially relies on a timeline consisting of stills from the film coupled with notation of musical themes that occur simultaneous to the shots represented by the stills. The approach 64 advantage of analysing complete scores is questionable in that often there is little point in cataloguing every cue. Especially in mainstream film, a firm set of conventions regarding the combining of music, sound, dialogue and visuals exists. Further mapping of these conventions is not necessarily productive; focussing on a relevant selection of cues is more valid in most situations.57
Rothbart aims for a relatively holistic approach. His score analyses proceed by recognition of recurring leitmotifs and their meaning at specific points, combined with occasional pointers to particular textural and instrumental characteristics. Included are also comments on other aspects capable of generating meaning, such as camera technique. Such analyses remain problematic, however: their ability to adequately describe the musical level of the film narrative decreases in relation to its complexity, especially in the case of analyses of entire film scores. The available options in these cases for dealing with specific cues are lengthy and detailed descriptions; selective descriptions of one or two events out of the gamut of events; or complete omission of discussion of the passage in question. Rothbart opts for the second and third options, as for instance in his analysis of John Corigliano’s complex score for Altered States (1980 dir. Ken Russell), specifically the discussion of the hallucination with the Hinchi Indians (121). This sequence, accompanied by climactic and highly complex orchestral music, receives a cursory description, with large segments of the score (in terms of both time and density) not included in the discussion. Rothbart treats contextualization as secondary to score analysis: the accompanying music to the earthy mushroom-worshipping ritual enacted by the Indians clearly owes much to Igor Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring, as does the mise-en-scène itself, though Rothbart does not allude to this connection.58 Full score analyses of this sort may pay lip service to every cue
works but begs the question of whether the stills actually assist the analysis. Understanding of the analysis presupposes access to the film; if access to the film is available, the stills are redundant and timecode would be a more economical method of referencing the film. The inclusion of stills in this context curtails space for the rest of the graphic analysis, which is reduced to brief monodic melodic signifiers. 57 There is motivation for a certain number of full score analyses, however. The Scarecrow Press Film Score Guides series, for instance, provides a rare platform for such analyses, allowing a single score and its composer to be thoroughly contextualized, and the structure and style of the score to be fully appreciated on the macro and micro levels. 58 See footnote 14 of the current chapter regarding temp tracks. Problems with temp tracks arise when the filmmakers become too attached to the temp track, and expect the composer to produce a 65 in the film, but this is at the cost of meaningful discussion of those cues.
Film music analysis as film analysis Perhaps the most prevalent form of analysis at present is a holistic blend of descriptive analysis of film cues with descriptions of simultaneous filmic events: camera work, lighting, editing, dialogue etc. In other words, what contemporary film music analysts are striving to achieve is not film music analysis per se but rather film analysis, with a particular focus on music, in reaction to the typically scopocentric approach of film studies. Kalinak points out that
Contemporary film music scholars have shaped a different model for film music’s operation in which music is seen as an interdependent and complementary element of a film’s narrative system. Music shares power to create meaning with a number of elements that come together to tell a story, among them mise-en-scène, cinematography, acting, editing, dialogue, and sound. (2010: 18)
Although music does indeed function together with all these other elements to construct the narrative, it also remains apart from them in being the only element that is not part of the visual narrative. Mise-en-scène, cinematography, acting and editing work together to construct the visual element. Dialogue and sound are usually, though not always, “cued” by the visual element through moving mouths and interacting objects.59 Music, on the other hand, most often has no visual cue, especially in the case of extra-diegetic music. A film’s visual component can cue diegetic music in various ways, some specific to the actual music heard and others non-specific. A character turning on a radio, for instance, is non-
near-identical cue to one used in the temp track. As a result, particular film music cues often carry clear traces of the music used as the temp track. 59 Close attention to the relationship between spoken dialogue and mouth movement can reveal the artifice of the re-recording process, even to the extent of adding in dialogue not physically spoken by the actor. Buhler, Neumeyer and Deemer (2010) provide an example of this in relation to Tom Hanks in the film Sleepless in Seattle (1993 dir. Nora Ephron). A far cruder example of course is the practice of overdubbing into a different language from the original. Less common today than in older films is the use of incorrect ambience on dialogue: this can often be noticed in “outdoors” scenes which are actually recorded, along with the dialogue, in the studio, resulting in room-type reverberation rather than the far lower levels of reverberation characteristic of the outdoors. From the body of South African film, Inspan (1953 dir. Bladon Peake) offers a very clear example of this phenomenon, beginning at 0:22:50. 66 specific in that there is no signification of what music will be heard, except that some styles will be more likely than others based on the film’s historical, geographical, spatial and social setting. Depictions of live performance on the other hand, such as a band playing a song, or an orchestra playing in a concert hall, are specific in that the viewer/auditor can match the sounds produced with the visual mechanics of the performers playing their instruments, in addition to the range of non-specific signifiers, which further curtail stylistic possibilities.
In the case of extra-diegetic music, however, the music truly is on a separate order of narrative from all of the visual elements, and thus while functioning with them, it also stands apart from them.60 For Donnelly, the result of the separation is that “[n]on-diegetic film music is a seemingly ‘irrational’ element in the context of the film’s construction of a ‘rational’ diegetic world on screen” (2005: 9). In relation to the diegetic characters, Donnelly sees extra-diegetic music as “supernatural”, unsensed by them but able to, “at times, ‘burst through’ from the ‘other side’” (9).61
History of film music A considerable expansion in the number of titles covering the history of (primarily Hollywood) film music has taken place in recent years. Cooke (2008) and Wierzbicki (2009) provide narrative critical histories. Cooke (2010) and Wierzbicki, Platt and Roust (2012) are readers, covering important but otherwise difficult to access historical source documents providing evidence of opinions and relevant issues that have historically been important to the understanding and trajectory of film music. Hubbert (2011) offers a hybrid of these two approaches. MacDonald (2013) provides a year-by-year history of Hollywood film music, with a specific focus on composer biographies and general score descriptions,
60 The composer has the option of writing strongly synchronized music with multiple hit points, in the style of Max Steiner for instance, but this is a stylistic choice made independently from the nature of the visual elements, and also does not change the layering of narrative orders. A composer not following a Steiner-influenced approach will not necessarily disturb viewers in the way that a technical issue would, such as consistently unsynchronized dialogue. 61 Such a reading relies heavily on suspension of disbelief, most specifically the disbelief in the simulacrum of reality created by the selection and manipulation of disparate images. 67 functioning more as reference source than critical history.62 Cooke (2008) and Kalinak (2010), the latter devoting three chapters to a historical overview, have in common that they take an international approach instead of confining their histories to Hollywood— though they are as quiet on the topic of African film music as the other sources here, barring very brief commentary by Kalinak on Egyptian, Moroccan and Tunisian film.
Theoretical relevance of mainstream film music studies Creation of film music theory has largely taken place in the context of mainstream film music studies; histories of film music have also tended towards a mainstream focus, or have taken mainstream history as a point of reference. This history is important as a reference point for the current study, as it has been for other studies of national film musics. The theoretical grounding of mainstream film music scholarship also provides important contextualization, through, for instance, conceptualization of film musical functions. Analytically, I draw precedents for the current study more from the concerns of national film music studies, and from the discipline of music analysis, than from mainstream film music analysis, barring certain exceptions such as Kassabian (2001) and Burnand and Sarnaker (1999). These authors engage with issues of the representation of identity, in contrast to trends in recent mainstream analysis, which include style analysis, formal analysis, structural analysis and comparative analysis.63
62 There are a number of earlier histories of film music; see for instance Marmorstein (1997), Thomas (1997), MacDonald (1998), Darby and Du Bois (1999), Lack (1999) and Hickman (2006). Brown (1994) and Davis (1999) also include chapter-length histories of film music. 63 I base this assertion on a study of analytically focussed content in the Journal of Film Music, from 2002 to the present. 68 Chapter 2 From Silents to Sound Film
Filmmakers worldwide may have preferred to cultivate nationalistic styles, but even on their home ground they remained in a small minority, and even the most defiantly non-commercial of them, although they were prone to reject Hollywood aesthetics, nonetheless were eager to adopt Hollywood technique. And this meant that the international film industry—by and large, and more or less quickly—imitated whatever Hollywood did vis-à-vis film music. (Wierzbicki 2009: 112-3)
This chapter aims to set the stage for the following chapters, exploring the period of silent film leading up to the focal area of the study, then covering the first years of sound film up to 1938. I begin by consolidating available information on film musical practice in the silent era, with a focus on the practice of film music at this time, and what little is known about the practitioners. I then examine the parameters in which South African film music operated by establishing the technical capabilities of the industry and its relationship to Hollywood practice in the early years of sound film. The films discussed in this chapter are addressed primarily in terms of the mechanics of the interaction of music and other elements of the narrative, especially in relation to the two earliest sound films, Sarie Marais and Moedertjie. This approach is partly necessary because of the unavailability of one and the limited use of music in the other. I then focus on the largest scoring project of the early years of the South African industry, namely Building a Nation, with a focus once more on setting the stage, providing profiles of the composers and an overview and initial interpretation of the score. I revisit Building a Nation in Chapter 3, where I offer a reading of the film in terms of identity through musical representation. The two remaining films of the 1930s, Rhodes of Africa and King Solomon’s Mines, are products of the British film industry rather than the South African film industry. I therefore omit discussion of them in this chapter, which is concerned with the mechanics of the South African industry, and discuss them as representational texts in Chapter 3. 69
The silent era Of the forty-eight films Moses (date unknown1) lists that were made in South Africa prior to the advent of sound film in the country in 1931, he lists only seven as still existing in whole or in part, either in SANFVSA1 or elsewhere, that have not been lost. These are A Story of the Rand (1916 dir. Lorrimer Johnston)2, The Gun Runner (1916 dir. Lorrimer Johnston)3, De Voortrekkers (1916 dir. Harold Shaw), The Rose of Rhodesia (1917 dir. Harold Shaw), The Symbol of Sacrifice (1918 dir. Isidore Schlesinger), King Solomon’s Mines (1918 dir. H. Lisle Lucoque)4 and Copper Mask (1919 dir. Joseph Albrecht). African Film Productions produced all of them, with the exception of The Rose of Rhodesia, produced by Fisher’s Bioscope.
The nature of silent film is such that the film reel and the music are separate. It thus does not automatically follow that scores potentially written for the forty-one lost films are no longer in existence. There are documented instances of scores written specifically for South African silent films. The country’s first epics, De Voortrekkers and Symbol of Sacrifice,5 had scores created especially for them by Henri ten Brink (Gutsche 1972: 315) and David Foote (1972: 317) respectively. Ten Brink was a violinist based in Pretoria, active as a teacher, chamber music player and orchestral concertmaster (Vlok 1986: 329). Vlok lists his score to De Voortrekkers as lost (1986: 330). Foote was a conductor and composer based in Johannesburg, whose career centred on conducting theatre orchestras (Wolpowitz 1982: 70). Gutsche comments on the music as heard at a private preview of Symbol of Sacrifice in Johannesburg on the 21st March 1918: “The accompanying music, specially composed by David Foote, was peculiarly impressive, particularly the playing of the ‘Marseillaise’ in a minor key during the funeral of the Prince Imperial” (317).6 I have
1 See Introduction, footnote 7. 2 “Sections (in reality, less than half a reel) only survive of this film” (Moses: date unknown1). 3 According to Moses, the version in SANFVSA consists of unedited footage. 4 According to Moses, the version in SANFVSA consists of unedited footage. 5 See Parsons (2013) for an analysis of these two films plus Rose of Rhodesia within the context of the genre of nation-building films. See also Maingard (2007) for analysis of the role of De Voortrekkers and The Symbol of Sacrifice in the development of Afrikaner nation-building and British empire-building respectively, and Hees (2003) for sociopolitical contextualization of De Voortrekkers and comparison with D.W. Griffith’s Birth of a Nation. 6 National anthems lend themselves particularly well to the kind of leitmotivic scoring prevalent in Hollywood in the 1930s and 1940s, since they come pre-packaged with very particular signifiers. 70 not been able to determine if Foote’s score to Symbol of Sacrifice still exists. Gutsche does not discuss the score’s instrumentation. The status of silent film scores in the country deserves further research, and, assuming sources are available, a dedicated study.
Part of such a study should be devoted to the nature of accompaniment supplied by live musicians in theatres. Extensive scholarship exists on this topic in the American industry, based on the piecemeal evidence available to scholars (e.g. Abel and Altman 2001, Marks 1997), though no scholarship has explored this area in relation to South Africa. Rompel (1937), in his plea for better music in theatres, provides some idea of the standard practice of music performance, discussed below. Writing in 1937, however, his comments postdate the establishment of sound film. Gutsche comments tantalizingly on the musical accompaniment for the 1912 film From the Manger to the Cross, shown in Johannesburg on the 8th February 1913:7
Apart from Mr Foote’s large orchestra which was to play suitable music from the great masters such as Handel, Gounod, Schubert, Thorne and others, Herr J. Tressi, one of the best known of Johannesburg’s musicians, was to play selected organ solos…. During the whole performance of one hour and forty five minutes (the film was 7000 feet long), there was to be no interval. (1972: 288)
The fact that there was no interval implies that the orchestra and the organ solos played either during, before or after the film. According to IMDb, the film is in 35mm format. For 7000 feet of film to last 105 minutes—the length Gutsche states for the “performance”—it would need to be played back at 18 frames per second, according to
This approach of course dates back at least as far as Tchaikovsky’s The Year 1812 festival overture in E♭ major, Op.49. Very similar usage is made of the technique in Max Steiner’s score for Casablanca (1942 dir. Michael Curtiz), particularly developing the German national anthem into an ominous minor version. David Foote is therefore tapping in to the standard tropes of Hollywood scoring even at this early stage in the history of South African film, or indeed of film more generally. 7 Unfortunately, Gutsche provides no source for her description of the events surrounding the concert. It is not clear if she personally attended the event or is quoting from a secondary source. 71
Scenesavers (2013).8 A more believeable length is around 88 minutes.9 The film thus appears to have lasted for most of the duration of the performance, which would mean the music was performed during the film—seventeen minutes would be unrealistically short for a concert by a full symphony orchestra, plus organ solos. That they would be playing “suitable” music also seems to imply accompaniment of visuals. That music and film played simultaneously is corroborated by another reference by Gutsche to musical accompaniment, again involving David Foote. The performance on this occasion was a film exhibition for Paul Kruger, the president of the South African Republic, at the Residency in Pretoria.
On the 19th January 1899, Edgar Hyman, Dave Foote (the musical director of the Empire [Palace of Varieties]) and an operator drove to Pretoria with their machine and some fifty films lasting about half a minute each…. While the films were being shown, Dave Foote played on an organ (Kruger refused to admit a piano). (1972: 32-35)
Gutsche’s source for this information appears to be Piet Grobler, secretary to Paul Kruger, who was present at the show (35). Gutsche reproduces the programme for this event, held on the 19th January, which states that the exhibition will be “as exhibited in the Empire Palace of Varieties, Johannesburg”. It includes the credit “Chef d’Orchestre: Mr David Foote”, and the first (and only musical) item on the programme is “Overture: Rhapsody on the celebrated Russian song ‘Oschi Chornia’ composed by Mr David Foote” (34). These references, together with the documentary evidence of silent film scores created by Foote
8 IMDb and the full version of the film on YouTube give its length as 71 minutes, while the Internet Archive version is 91 minutes long. 9 I am indebted to Examiner2, one of the anonymous reviewers of this thesis, for providing this figure, which is based on the following explanation:
The first standard set by SMPTE wasn’t until 1917 – and the specifications at that time spoke of feet per minute, rather than fps. Assuming the 1917 standard was used this would mean the film was shot at 60 feet per minute. Even so, it is important to remember that not only were both cameras and projectors hand cranked at that time (i.e. this was not an accurate process by today’s standards) but projectionists routinely cranked faster than the camera operator. Indeed shooting at 60 feet per minute but projecting at 80 feet per minute was a later specification from SMPTE. Assuming the 7000 feet of film figure to be accurate … projecting at 80 feet per minute would give a length of 87.5 minutes. 72 and Ten Brink, all seem to provide firm evidence that orchestral accompaniment of silent films was standard practice in South Africa as early as the final years of the 19th century.
The beginning of sound: mainstream contexts Although The Jazz Singer (1927 dir. Alan Crosland) is often cited as the beginning of sound film, historians of mainstream film music, including Wierzbicki (2009) and Hubbert (2011), have stressed that the process of change from silent to sound was one of gradual transition, not sudden revolution. These authors mark out a period before 1927 in which various experiments, as early as 1898, were conducted in the synchronization of sound and film. Similarly, after 1927, silent films continued to be made, and the technology of sound film continued to develop incrementally, culminating in the technological innovations that allowed the “classical” Hollywood scoring style to emerge around 1935.
Initially, recording of sound was constrained by the non-existence of multitrack recording technology. All sound was recorded in a single take in conjunction with the shooting of the visuals, though the practice of re-recording sound after the visuals were shot was established early on, as was the practice of recording sound first, to which the performers would then synchronize (Hubbert 2011: 119). Regardless of whether the sound was recorded before, during or after the visuals, the three elements of the soundtrack, namely dialogue, sound effects and music, all had to be recorded simultaneously. Omnidirectional microphones, which picked up all sounds indiscriminately, made separation of individual sounds difficult. Any extra-diegetic underscore used as simultaneous background to dialogue had to be recorded in a single take with the dialogue, and was generally impractical for reasons of balance.
By the beginning of 1931, sound recording technology had progressed to enable a much more flexible approach. Directional microphones allowed for recording of selective sound sources, which, together with the development of the mixer, allowed for multitrack recording. Multitrack recording meant that the various elements of the soundtrack could be recorded separately and balance could be attained during postproduction (2011: 123).
Added to the technological issues involved in sound recording, ideological issues also influenced the use of music. At the beginning of the 1930s, a debate took place regarding 73 the appropriateness of the inclusion of extra-diegetic music, and the conviction that music should always be diegetic, lest the audience be confused by hearing music that has no clear source onscreen.
South African early sound films The 1930s saw the creation of only six South African feature films. Two of these films, namely Rhodes of Africa (193610 dir. Berthold Viertel) and King Solomon’s Mines (1937 dir. Robert Stevenson) are Gaumont British productions11 which qualify for inclusion in South African film studies through their South African setting.12 There are therefore only four locally produced South African films from the 1930s, all made by African Film Productions (AFP). These are Sarie Marais (1931 dir. Joseph Albrecht), Moedertjie (1931 dir. Joseph Albrecht),13 ‘n Dogter van die Veld (1933 dir. J. Sinclair); and Building a Nation (1938 dir. Joseph Albrecht).
Sarie Marais is not available for viewing—the copy in SANFVSA is a master, being apparently the only copy in existence. SANFVSA’s copy of ‘n Dogter van die Veld is a duplicate negative, making viewing of this film prohibited as well.14
10 Some sources, e.g. le Roux and Fourie (1982: 29) and Moses (date unknown1), probably on the strength of the former source, give the date for Rhodes of Africa as 1933, while others, such as the British Film Institute, give it as 1936. This probably reflects a difference between production date and release date. The print of the film I consulted includes no date in its credits. 11 Moses (date unknown1) lists King Solomon’s Mines as an AFP production, but according to the information provided by the film’s credits the production company is Gaumont British. 12 I discuss these films in Chapter 3. 13 At approximately 30 minutes each, Sarie Marais and Moedertjie are considerably shorter than the feature film norm, though the latter has been erroneously described as “the first full length Afrikaans feature film” (see Screen Africa 2011). 14 Many South African films are not commercially available, and therefore the only way to view them is at SANFVSA. Viewing conditions for the older films, only available in 16mm format, are very poor. The condition of the film often results in the soundtrack sounding warped and fluttery. Sometimes shrinking of the film over time results in loud clatters during playback. The desk plays the film back too fast so that the frequency of the soundtrack is too high. Rewinding is not possible. The sound is projected through a single small, aged speaker. Precision can be difficult when watching under these conditions. It is regrettable that SANFVSA does not have the necessary facilities to provide quality access to the collection’s materials. There is no official catalogue of the films or any of the other content at the archive. Some content is available on the incomplete electronic catalogue for the National Archives as a whole, but SANFVSA lacks its own, independent catalogue. 74
Regarding the technological and ideological issues discussed above in relation to mainstream contexts, the experience of these issues in the South African context can presently only be surmised from study of the film texts themselves. Moedertjie’s approach to extra-diegetic music suggests it may well have suffered from technological challenges, including the inability to separately record music and dialogue, or from ideological dogma, given its non-inclusion of music outside of the very beginning and end. By the time of Building a Nation, it is clear that the South African industry was up to speed with contemporaneous Hollywood technology and ideology, demonstrating a multi-layered soundtrack and near-constant music, clearly recorded separately from accompanying dialogue.
Sarie Marais (1931) South Africa’s first sound film was Sarie Marais, a short film about Boer15 prisoners-of- war in Sri Lanka at the end of the 2nd South African War.16 Gutsche ascribes the music to “‘The Melodians’ and Chris Blignaut, both of whom figured in the film” (1972: 324). They play “Sarie Marais”, “the song running throughout the slight plot on a nostalgic note” (324). Le Roux and Fourie (1982: 26) state that these musicians contributed the performance of the song “Sarie Marais”, and that the song binds the fragmentary story together.17
Moedertjie (1931) South Africa’s second sound film, Moedertjie, was released the same year as Sarie Marais, made by the same production company and the same director. It tells the story of an old rural couple who come by train to Maraisburg to find their son Hennie, whom they have not heard of for two years after his move to the city in search of work. While waiting at
15 The term “Boer” refers to those claiming ancestry from the early Dutch settlers in the Cape. It is the Dutch word for “farmer”, which was the principle occupation of many such settlers. Over time, and with influence from other ethnic groups, their language evolved into what is today known as Afrikaans. 16 Naming conventions differ for these two conflicts, which are often referred to as the Boer or Anglo-Boer Wars. I opt for the convention followed by Beck (2014: 102). See this source for a discussion of naming conventions. 17 Although Sarie Marais is not viewable at the archives, and no other source for the film seems to be available, a performance of the eponymous song, claiming to be from the film, is available on YouTube. See Chris Blignaut and The Melodians (2013). 75 the train station, they first encounter (by chance) Hennie’s former fiancée, and then Hennie himself, as a policeman who is transporting him to jail for stabbing somebody brings him in. After a tearful reunion, Hennie escapes the policeman and throws himself in front of a train, death the only escape from the shame of “hierdie hel van ‘n lewe” [this hell of a life] that he has come to inhabit.
Moedertjie includes no original music: the only music used is an arrangement of Antonin Dvořák’s “Songs My Mother Taught Me” from the song cycle Gypsy Songs Op.55 (1880), originally for soprano and piano, but here scored for piano quartet (violin, viola, cello and piano). The arrangement is uncredited. The lyrics evoke the same melancholy nostalgia for motherly love found in Moedertjie, the themes of which include the corruption of rural children and their alienation from their parents when they move to the city in search of work:
Songs my mother taught me, In the days long vanished; Seldom from her eyelids Were the teardrops banished. Now I teach my children, Each melodious measure. Oft the tears are flowing, Oft they flow from my memory's treasure. (Adolf Heyduk, trans. Natalie Macfarren (adapted from Ezust 2004))
Moedertjie herself succeeds in drawing out the back stories of Hennie, his fiancée, and even the policeman, all of whom are refugees from “die bosveld” [the bush; rural areas], their lives in the city providing livelihood at the cost of loss of innocence and family ties. Moedertjie’s pure country values and ample love starkly foregrounds to them what they have lost. Maingard (2007: 49) draws attention to the film’s relentless situating of the story not just in Maraisburg or the urban environment but in the goldfields and their related community, implicitly laying the blame for the corruption of rural youth like Hennie and his fiancée on the social impact of the mining industry.
Despite the Dvořák song’s close thematic ties to the film, there is minimal use of music to support the narrative. The minute-long opening credits and the final minute of the film are the only moments with musical accompaniment. Although the music therefore plays a 76 minor role in terms of time and dramatic impact, evidence that visuals are edited to music— rather than vice versa—prioritizes its presence. During the opening credits, each period consisting of two four-bar phrases in 6/8 time lasts around fifteen seconds. There are four such periods (although the last one consists of two five-bar phrases), giving a total playing time of just over a minute. The credit pages are clearly cut to fit with these phrases: there are, once more, four pages, each displayed for fifteen seconds and changing at the beginning of each new period.
The reprisal of the second half of the song in the last minute of the film is the only point where music accompanies the narrative. It undergoes a simple form of musical development, played at approximately two-thirds of the original tempo. This adds to the pathos of the final scene where Hennie’s parents and fiancée are dealing with their fresh grief at his suicide, and the fiancée is offered a chance of redemption through being invited “terug na die bosveld” [back to the country] by Hennie’s parents.
The musical distribution in Moedertjie matches Wierzbicki’s description of Hollywood practices at this time:
By the end of 1929… most of the studios—including Paramount—were using extra-diegetic music only in a film’s title credits and in the minute or so that preceded the emphatic on-screen words “The End.” (2009: 119)
These first two sound films set the trends that dominate South African film music until the end of the 1950s. Sarie Marais captures a diegetic boeremusiek performance, the players themselves featured onscreen as musicians masquerading as members of the film’s fictional universe. Moedertjie, meanwhile, avoids original music in favour of pre-existing music, in this case an arrangement of a concert music piece. The alternation of these two elements was standard practice in many films, though due to space constraints I only briefly discuss such films in this study.18
18 See footnote 7 of Chapter 5 for examples of these films. 77
Building a Nation (1938) Building a Nation was the last South African feature film made in the 1930s. Commissioned as part of the centenary celebrations of the Great Trek, it was highly controversial on release for being massively over-budget and racially divisive (Gutsche 1972). It marks a return to the genre of the big-budget epic pioneered in South Africa by De Voortrekkers and Symbol of Sacrifice. Charles Manning and John Connell are the film’s credited composers.
From 1936, Manning was the conductor of the Colosseum Orchestra, a cinema orchestra of approximately thirty musicians established in 1933 at the Colosseum Theatre in Johannesburg (1972: 236). The existence of an in-house orchestra appears to have been unique in South African cinema theatres at the time. According to Gutsche, “the expense of its maintenance precluded the institution of similar orchestras elsewhere” (236). Gutsche does also mention the Empire Palace of Varieties orchestra, though it existed considerably earlier than 1936 (1972: 32-33). Based on the credits for Kom Saam, Vanaand (1949 dir. Pierre de Wet), the orchestra still existed in 1949 and was still conducted by Manning. In Hollywood, by 1930 theatre orchestras had largely migrated to the film studios, with much downsizing and subsequent unemployment (Wierzbicki 2009: 113). The Colosseum Theatre possibly retained its orchestra into the era of sound because it functioned as a live music performance venue as well as a film theatre (Pamela 2009). The Johannesburg City Orchestra and the South African Broadcasting Corporation Orchestra were performing symphony concerts there in 1946 (De Jongh 2007: 15-16).
Aside from being a prominent conductor in Johannesburg, Manning is documented by Ballantine (2012: 98) for another reason. The black jazz group The Jazz Maniacs, who would later appear as the band in African Jim, were threatened with legal action by a white band who had adopted the same name. Manning was called in to conduct both bands and adjudicate between them, on the lawns outside the Johannesburg Supreme Court, based on their notation-reading skills. Manning declared the black Jazz Maniacs the winners, who were thus allowed to retain the name.
Connell served as city organist and director of music in Johannesburg from 1916 to 1950 (Malan 1979: 294; Mears and May: no date). He was very active as an organist, choral and 78 orchestral conductor, academic and promoter of youth music. He also staged operas and organized music festivals (1979: 294-298). Organ played an important role in early South African film. Gutsche cites a number of documentary films from the 1930s accompanied by organ (see for example 1972: 325). Larger cinema theatres installed Wurlitzer organs, such as the Alhambra in Cape Town, which had the first “Mighty Wurlitzer”, installed in 1929 and played by Max Bruce (KenRoe 2012). Bruce created the all-organ score for Geboortegrond (1946), discussed in Chapter 5.
Scored for orchestra, the music of Building a Nation tends stylistically towards 19th-century Romanticism, reminiscent particularly of Dvořák and Beethoven. There is a trend towards the use of conventional musical signifiers: gentle pastoral music accompanies country scenes; a trumpet fanfare accompanies a scene of a fort; the appearance of dignitaries inspires a grand, pompous musical style. Stylistically, it follows similar principles to Richards’s (2001) description in Chapter 3 of Rhodes of Africa: a very literal style providing music redundant from an informational point of view, aiming to enhance or deepen the surface experience of an onscreen image rather than expand on or interrogate the information provided by the image. This approach relies on standard musical tropes— musical signifiers with clear signifieds capable of being understood by a wide cross-section of the public. In the terminology of Cook’s model of multimedia, the image and music are coherent rather than complementary or contrary (Cook 1998: 99).
The film covers four hundred years in the space of two hours; structurally, it therefore consists of short tableaux, with few narrative links beyond the macro narrative framework of “the building of a nation”. The scarcity of recurring narrative themes and characters is reflected musically, though some musical thematic recurrence takes place in conjunction with certain recurring narrative motifs. One theme in particular is associated with moments of triumph for the Afrikaner nation. It is heard when Piet Retief and the Voortrekkers set out from Grahamstown, and in the final scene of the film, which depicts a farmer’s wife sowing a ploughed field, overlaid with the caption “Die Unie van Suid Afrika” [The Union of South Africa], followed by further shots of verdant agriculture. The symbolism is clear: the Afrikaner people have tamed the land and put it to productive use, their long struggle resulting in the successful “building of a nation”. Maingard (2007: 54) draws attention to this final scene as a microcosm of South African society: the farmer controls the plough; 79 the farmer’s wife follows, scattering the seeds, both “partner in his process of production” but also following behind and thus subservient, a symbol of patriarchal society; and the plough is pulled by oxen, led by a black manservant. The survival of the Afrikaner nationalist model of nation “depends on harnessing the figure of the black servant to the yoke”.
Example 1: “Triumph” theme from the final scene of Building a Nation
Example 1 presents this “triumph” theme from the final scene,19 its four-part stately grandeur suggesting a national anthem-like quality. “Die Stem”20 might have been expected here instead, since it was adopted in 1936, two years before the release of the film. Perhaps it was felt to be anachronistic, given this theme characterizes the Afrikaner nation from the 19th century on. The anthem-like quality of the theme is telling, however, in the context of the film, which is about nation-building—from the savage, untamed
19 All musical examples are my own transcriptions from the films’ soundtracks. 20 “’Die Stem’ was the co-national anthem with God Save the King/Queen from 1936 to 1957, when it became the sole national anthem until 1994” (The Presidency: Republic of South Africa: no date). 80 landscape has arisen a nation in the European model, signified musically by the pompous, regal, stately tone of the anthem, which strives for the quality of the likes of “God Save the Queen” and “La Marseillaise”.
Building a Nation‘s approach to extra-diegetic underscore at times follows the literal approach to scoring popular in Hollywood output during this period, typified by composer Max Steiner. At its best this approach marries expression of emotional content with expression of physical gesture, as Steiner does in King Kong (1933 dir. Merian Cooper and Ernest Schoedsack) and The Informer (1935 dir. John Ford). In King Kong, for instance, as the chief of the island slowly walks towards Carl Denham and his film crew on their first encounter, Steiner carefully synchronizes the tempo of the accompanying underscore with the chief’s footsteps, while the general mood of the music is ominous, warning of the impending danger to the crew. In Building a Nation, the physical correlation of the music to the film is never as direct as it is with the Steiner scores, though it generally follows the action and makes use of standard musical tropes in relation to the visuals.
Use of pre-existing classical music is another prominent feature. Debate regarding the use of such music was common in the early years of sound film. Pre-existing classical music occurs in a number of scenes of Building a Nation. The overture of Wagner’s The Flying Dutchman (1843) accompanies Bartholomew Diaz’s storm-tossed ship (or at least a small model thereof). The slow movement of Beethoven’s 7th Symphony (1811-1812) provides pathos as a survivor of the attack on the Voortrekkers under Piet Retief dies in the arms of his family; and the slow movement of Beethoven’s 5th Piano Concerto (1809) accompanies the founding of Pietermaritzburg. The use of these canonical (German) classics to accompany pivotal moments of pathos and drama provides insight into white South Africa’s self-image, and perhaps—a year before the beginning of the 2nd World War— serves as a signifier of South Africa’s ambivalence regarding which side to take.
In contrast to how pre-existing classical works are incorporated in some later films, there is little sense of intent here regarding the choice of music—other music could just as easily be used. The selected music fails to act as a motif, binding with the visual element to present an idea or concept. Probably the most successful examples of this approach are the films of Stanley Kubrick, who as Vivian Sobchack points out, “uses ‘unoriginal’ film music 81 originally” (quoted in Scheurer 1998: 181).21 Examples include 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968) and The Shining (1980), and the synthesized reworking of Beethoven and Purcell by Wendy Carlos in Kubrick’s A Clockwork Orange (1971). Photographing Fairies (1997 dir. Nick Willing) is another excellent example also making use of Beethoven’s 7th Symphony. The Allegretto 2nd movement bonds with the visuals to express the transcendence of Charles Castle’s understanding of life and death, and the profundity of the vision of “heaven” into which he enters at the end of the film. This is all tinged with the fateful determination he has demonstrated in his quest and the alternative possibility that his experience of the afterlife at the end is all a final, tragic delusion.
Finally, the combination of diegetic and extra-diegetic music is an important stylistic feature. Films frequently use diegetic music to characterize social groups, and the use in Building a Nation clearly fits this model, characterizing the Voortrekkers as peaceful and godly, and the Zulus as warlike and terrifying. I explore the politics of diegetic versus extra-diegetic portrayal in detail in the following chapters.
Concluding remarks As early as 1899, theatre orchestras accompanied silent film in South Africa, and keyboard accompaniment was also considered an option, both inside and outside the theatre context. Even foreign films received orchestral accompaniment, in the form of popular classical works. How these were assigned, and whether they were played in whole or in part, with no, some, or close attention to the visuals, is unknown. Also unknown is the culture behind these orchestras, including the amateur or professional status of the players, how often they practiced, the number and type of musicians etc.
Despite Moedertjie’s limited inclusion of music, there are suggestions that some thought went towards its interaction with the narrative. The clear correlation with Wierzbicki’s description of early 1930s mainstream musical practice suggests an awareness of musical trends, especially regarding the inclusion of diegetic music. The thematic correlations
21 The various books and articles devoted to the study of music in Kubrick’s films serve as testimony to this “original” use of “unoriginal” music. See for instance Bodde (2002), Paulus (2009) and Gengaro (2013); the latter source includes reference to numerous other sources dealing with Kubrick’s use of music. 82 between lyrics and film then, and the structural correlations between musical phrases and credits pages also suggests some careful musical consideration, which regrettably was not always the case in later films utilizing pre-recorded music. The two basic trends of diegetic boeremusiek in Sarie Marais and pre-existing music in Moedertjie set the standard for years to come, however.
Sarie Marais, Moedertjie and Building a Nation demonstrate the political harnessing of sound film from its earliest beginnings in the country. All three exhibit Afrikaner nationalist agendas: Sarie Marais and Moedertjie through case studies of the status of members of the Afrikaner community, and Building a Nation through an epic account of the history of the Afrikaner people. Sarie Marais focusses on nostalgia for a past existence after the disruption and displacement caused by the 2nd South African War. Moedertjie highlights the desperation of rural dwellers caused by this displacement, whose situation was exacerbated by the severe droughts at the beginning of the 20th century coupled with land mismanagement.22 Yet, while the partial solution for Afrikaners was achieved through making the situation much worse for blacks through legislation such as the 1913 Natives’ Land Act,23 Moedertjie sentimentalizes the issue through a focus on the Afrikaans family unit, showing the helplessness of the kindly, aged couple and the disempowerment and degradation of their son. The music is chosen to directly capitalize on this pathos, with its focus on the figure of the mother. The music of Building a Nation, by contrast, expresses a nationalist spirit through associating itself with the grandeur and refinement of the Germanic Romantic musical canon, and using specifically composed orchestral music, an extravagance unique to this production in the early years of South African sound film. Chapter 5 will continue this topic, demonstrating how certain films utilize these strategies of pathos and grandeur, and others besides, to express their nationalist sympathies.
22 See for instance Bonner (2011: 256-261). 23 Ibid. 83
Chapter 3 Rural African Music in South African Film
Studies of South African film award the title of earliest film with an (almost) all-black cast to the 1949 production African Jim.1 In it, black protagonists play black music, coded, as Dovey and Impey (2010) argue, for a black audience. Yet this was by no means the first portrayal of African music and dance on film in a South African context. Although 1930s film output was extremely limited, it was characterized by its output of adventure films and historical epics: these films capitalized on South African landscapes and on the nation- /empire-building mythologies of both Afrikaans and English colonists. Central to both these mythologies were victories over indigenous populations; the more resistance offered by a people, the more prominent their role in the mythology. For this reason, peoples with a strong military tradition, such as the Zulus and Matabele, are most prominent. The culminative points of these mythologies are the battles where the colonizers defeat these nations, such as Blood River in Afrikaner mythology, and Rorke’s Drift and the First Matabele War in English mythology. Inevitably, filmic recountings of these events use music to characterize both sides in these conflicts. Almost universally, this involves diegetic music for the Africans, and extra-diegetic underscore for the Europeans.
This chapter will demonstrate the crucial role of this difference in promoting a colonial agenda, as one example of how film music determines representation of black characters and culture in these films. In relation to the 1930s to 1940s, I analyse how the use of music, which superficially offers “authentic” depictions of African performance practice, is implicated in undermining the “performers”2 themselves and providing implicit support for colonial attitudes. I primarily achieve this through alternative readings of the film texts, foregrounding the roles of black characters, who, when not militarized, are consigned to servitude, intended to be invisible beyond tasks of carrying and fetching. In all these films, adventure and pseudo-historical alike, African peoples play a central role, primarily as
1 See for instance Davis (1996a: 22), Maingard (2007: 78), and Botha (2012: 35). 2 As will be discussed within the chapter, alleged performance is more often a simulacrum of such. 84 antagonists whose aggression is portrayed as unwarranted and typically savage. The exploitative colonialism justified through this attitude is evident throughout these early films, from King Solomon’s Mines (1937),3 a fictional adventure story, to Rhodes of Africa (1936) and Building a Nation (1938), which entertain the conceit of historical accuracy. Part of this portrayal takes place through onscreen, diegetic musical performance, often combined with dance. By reinterpretation and reversal of primary and secondary levels of foregrounding in such scenes, new meanings arise.
Stylistically and chronologically, there is a separation between films including rural styles of music, usually signified as “traditional” African music, and urban styles of African music, usually incorporating influences from African American popular music. This separation informs the conceptual design of this chapter and Chapter 4, and draws attention to the changing roles of black characterization through music over time. The change is a reflection of how filmmakers and society conceptualized black characters to fit political requirements of particular times.
The rural environment Rural indigenous music in film, from its earliest appearances up until the 1960s, is always incorporated diegetically. There are a number of reasons for this. Principally, diegetic presentation functions as a distancing tool: the filmmakers display the music, together with the people who make it, rather than participate in it through claiming ownership of it as an aesthetic tool forming part of the film’s expressive arsenal. It is objectified, and the filmmakers can feign objectivity towards it, without having to take responsibility for it. Diegetic music can thus serve as a vehicle for othering, especially when contrasted with the “neutral” musical language of the extra-diegetic underscore, which has at its disposal the conventions of narrative cueing so familiar as to be taken for granted. The underscore can thus guide the receptive viewer towards a particular interpretation of character and scenario, creating a norm against which others are measured.
3 The white explorers’ assistance in installing Umbopa as the leader of the Kukuana could be read as allegorical for the colonial installation of puppet rulers. The London Times review of the film noted such a reading in its description of the story as “European adventurers in search of mining concessions from the pretender to whom they give support” (quoted in Cameron 1994: 27). 85
There are various possible reasons why indigenous music would be incorporated diegetically, rather than extra-diegetically. Firstly, it would be impractical for most composers to adapt indigenous music into their underscore: lack of experience of the style, and concerns of cultural appropriation (at least in later films) are two issues. Such a situation would perhaps mean that the composer selected was not a suitable choice to begin with—someone familiar with the style in question would be a better choice. In the South African context, the possibility of employing such a composer or musician only started to become viable towards the end of the period under discussion in this study. A second approach would be arrangement of material from its original instrumental source to a Western orchestral idiom. Examples of this approach do occur in films from this period, such as in Rhodes of Africa (1936), discussed below. This type of approach is prone to both expressive and ideological issues. A third possibility is to incorporate recordings of indigenous music into the extra-diegetic music track. Such recordings could have various origins: field recordings made specifically for the film, studio recordings of the practitioners themselves made specifically for the film, or pre-existing recordings. The Naked Prey (1966) uses the first two approaches, with mixed results, as I discuss below. Karlin and Wright (2004) document some examples and associated problems with the recording of musicians in a studio environment who are not familiar with the conventions of film music practice. For smaller budget productions, the studio option is not financially viable. Field recordings and pre-existing music are feasible from a technical standpoint; indeed Come Back, Africa (1959), discussed below, follows one or both of these approaches. Such an approach may have had less stringent copyright implications in the 1950s compared to today.
The principle reason why particularly the earlier films in this chapter do not follow any of these approaches for including indigenous music on the extra-diegetic track is ideological, since the films foreground white rather than black protagonists. The films tend to explicitly emphasize the protagonists’ Europeanness, foregrounding their difference from their African surroundings: the protagonists’ motivation is either to rework Africa in their own image (Rhodes of Africa, Building a Nation) or exploit it and move on (King Solomon’s Mines). 86
The 1930s to 1940s Rhodes of Africa (1936) Being products of the British film industry, the music of both Rhodes of Africa and King Solomon’s Mines has been discussed in other sources, e.g. Richards (2001).4 Richards provides a taste of the score for Rhodes of Africa:
[the] music is unremarkable, certainly by comparison with the lush Hollywood scores. Rhodes is quite lightly scored by the uncredited Hubert Bath. There is chase music over the diamond rush, native drums and Matabele chants as an ox-wagon is surrounded. There is a war dance of the young Matabele and trumpets versus native chants over the confrontation of the pioneers and the Matabele. The pioneer column sets out to an heroic, jaunty march, punctuated by fanfares. The early part of the march is rerun, speeded up, over the Jameson Raid. (2001: 302-3)
Richards considers Bath’s music typical of the period. It competently fulfils the film scoring requirements of the time. To contemporary listeners, the “bioscore” created of the Matabele5 is perhaps the most interesting element of the soundtrack. Some of the standard tropes of Hollywood scoring of indigenous peoples make their way into the score. At times, such as the marshalling of forces for battle between Rhodes’s soldiers and the Matabele, Bath borrows the scoring of the Matabele wholesale from the conventions of scoring Native Americans in Hollywood Westerns: blaring brass, angular pentatonic melodies and bare fifths.6 When the Matabele are mentioned, as for instance in the film’s introduction, a horn plays a short melodic motif—which will recur at subsequent mentions of the Matabele—accompanied by a simple drumbeat which must have sounded appropriate to British ears at the time as a generic signifier of nativeness:
4 Burns (2010) offers an analysis and reception history of Rhodes of Africa, including a source list. 5 “Matabele” is a chiefly historical term for the Ndebele (Oxford English Dictionary 2014). When referring to the filmic depiction of the Ndebele in the context of Rhodes of Africa, I refer to them as the film does, namely as the Matabele, since this is the name of the role they have been allotted in the context of the narrative. When referring to them outside the context of the film, I refer to them as the Ndebele. 6 See Pisani (2005) and Gorbman (2000) for discussion of the origins of these conventions in relation to Native Americans. 87
Example 2: Matabele motif from Rhodes of Africa
The scoring in Example 2 characterizes the Matabele in a familiar filmic and colonial role, as the primitive Other in the uncomplicated cowboys and Indians trope of colonizers delivering civilization and enlightenment. An accurate account of the Matabele is secondary to the dramatic role they are required to play in this colonial narrative template. Bath’s horn melody is a transcription of part of a call-and-response song performed by Matabele warriors as they escort Rhodes to their chief. The transcription does not meet the ethnomusicological standards even of its own time, in its sterilizing, unnuanced approach to medium, genre, place and culture, retaining only melodic contour.
Although Bath creates a fantasy version of Ndebele drumming, the diegetic soundtrack in fact offers its own version. As Rhodes and Jameson enter Matabele territory, Matabele warriors communicate their presence through drums: a series of shots depicts Matabele drummers standing on different hilltops beating different types of drums in a constant, even rhythm [0:31:51]. The shots clearly signify that the drummers are passing the message from hilltop to hilltop. The even, undifferentiated rhythm gives the lie to the “authenticity” of the depiction, however: communication by drum over large distances, aside from being an extraordinarily fast way of sending messages for the time,7 was also very nuanced, capable of delivering complex, detailed messages conveying very particular information (Gleick 2011: Chapter 1, para. 1 and 4). By 1936, however, this skill was becoming extinct in the face of industrial technology like the telegraph and the radio (Dyson 2011).8 It is
7 There was no faster way until the development of the electric telegraph in the mid-19th century. African drummers could send messages at 100 miles per hour (Davis 2011). 8 The information pertaining to African drumming from the sources cited in this paragraph originally refers particularly to practice in the Democratic Republic of Congo. However, the use of drums for communication occurred in many other regions as well, and was used by the Ndebele. Kwashirai (2009: 38) cites an 1898 Native Commissioner report in the Zimbabwean National 88 unlikely therefore that the actors playing the part of the Matabele warriors would have had knowledge of this skill, as demonstrated by their performance. What the casual viewer would likely take for authenticity is thus undermined on closer inspection by the actual performance of the supposedly authentic act: the aural result of this act is not far different from Bath’s own take on African drumming, which was perhaps based on viewing this very same drumming scene.
The film itself thus perpetuates the trope of African primitivity on which the film is based: it presents its own version of authenticity, supported by the fact that black (though not necessarily) Matabele actors are called upon to perform a simplified version of their own cultural history, which has been lost through contact with Western colonial power. The same filmmakers then misinterpret this manufactured authenticity as actual authentic cultural practice, which the composer uses as the basis for the creation of “authentic” music to serve as a motif for the Matabele. This self-generated “authentic” motif fits in perfectly with the metanarrative of African backwardness in relation to the metanarrative of Rhodes and of colonial exploitation in general, summed up in the description of Rhodes by the character Anna Carpenter as “the one real genius that South Africa has produced” [0:26:00].
For all Rhodes of Africa’s colonial agenda, filmically coercing the Matabele into an endorsement of Rhodes and their own servitude through their supposed salute of him at his funeral,9 this salute does present one of the few instances in film of this period where indigenous African music is given the opportunity to be heard outside a warlike context. War did of course play an important role in the history of the Ndebele (see for instance South African History Online3 (no date)), but as with all societies, it was one aspect of life,
Archives that mentions the use of drums for communication by Ndebele. See National Archives of Zimbabwe (1898). 9 Davis (1996a) discusses this device of the African warriors saluting the bravery of their white conquerors in relation to the later film Zulu (1964 dir. Cy Endfield). A version of it also occurs at the end of The Naked Prey (1966 dir. Cornel Wilde), where the leader of the African warriors salutes the victorious hunter they have been pursuing. Many sources recount the Matabele/Rhodes version, which seems to be regarded as historical fact. The earliest source I have managed to trace this story to is McDonald (1927). McDonald was an associate of Rhodes who was present at his funeral, which took place in 1902. 89 not its totality, and music was used in a wide variety of social situations. Although funereal rather than martial at least in context, the song in Example 3 is still sung by warriors:
Example 3: Matabele song accompanying Rhodes’s funeral [1:29:42]
Choral singing takes precedence over solo singing; drums take precedence over bow and wind instruments. Martial music, in other words, takes precedence over social music. The one-dimensional approach to music is part of the process of the depiction of the Matabele themselves as one-dimensional. The film reduces them culturally to a series of warlike actions accompanied only by warlike music; this is necessary in order to maintain the film’s explicit support of coloniality. By depicting scenes incorporating diegetic, supposedly “authentic” music, the filmmakers create an impression of objectivity, showing the Matabele as they “really” are. The omissions, however, are more telling than the inclusions in the film’s use of music to support its colonial agenda.
King Solomon’s Mines (1937) Mischa Spoliansky’s score for King Solomon’s Mines is most notable for its songs performed by Paul Robeson. Aside from these three songs, written by Spoliansky (Richards 2001: 303), there is minimal use of underscore. Even the scoring of the opening credits consists of an orchestral version of one of these songs, “Climbing Up”. The score includes certain musical elements loosely associated in the popular culture of the time with Africa in the most general sense. The style jars with Robeson’s character of Umbopa, the African chief.10 “The Wagon Song”, with its mostly pentatonic melody, has elements of
10 Cameron (1994: 26) comments of Robeson’s involvement in the film, “As well, he had to sing, so that at times the film sounds like Old King Solomon’s River” [a reference to Robeson’s performance of the song “Ol’ Man River” from Show Boat (1936 dir. James Whale)]. 90 jazz of the period in its harmony and instrumentation. The post-credits scoring accompanies the establishing shots of Quartermain’s11 diary, the map to the mines and shots (ostensibly) of Kimberley. The cue presents a static crotchet harp ostinato between 1̂ and 5̂.12 Above this is a meandering minor pentatonic oboe solo and an accompanying horn in the same scale. These elements produce a stereotype of musical exoticism. The orchestral instruments used are chosen for their potential to stand in for more exotic instruments: the oboe for more ancient double-reed instruments, and the horn and harp likewise for non-Western brass and string instruments, while the pentatonic scale adds to the exoticism of the whole. This generic approach to exoticism parallels H. Rider Haggard’s original novel, which is non-specific regarding just where in Africa the action takes place.13 Although the protagonists start out concretely enough in Durban, the location of the land of the Kukuanas is not specified, though according to Wikipedia,14 the description in the book would place it somewhere in the “extreme south-east of the Democratic Republic of Congo” (King Solomon’s Mines 2014). The film, in contrast, concretizes the location, and the date, through Commander Good’s diary, which announces the event of an eclipse over South Africa on 2nd June 1882.15 This introduces geographical and cultural problems. For instance, the Kukuana are shocked when they encounter a firearm for the first time; by concretizing the location, the film makes the claim that a group of people in South Africa were unacquainted with firearms in 1882, which shows a careless willingness to reimagine real places and people in support of exotic, romanticized fictions of Africa.
11 The character’s name in the original H. Rider Haggard novel is Quatermain, but this film and others refer to him as Quartermain. 12 The accent symbol above the numbers is the standard signifier for scale degrees. The tonal centre of the extract under discussion is A. Therefore, scale degree 1 is A, while scale degree 5 is five steps higher up the scale, namely the pitch E. 13 The Kukuana tribe however, shares many traits with the typical filmic portrayal of Zulus; see Davis (1996a: 146-7) for an analysis of the portrayal of this tribe in relation to Zulu stereotypes in film. Rider Haggard makes much of the commonalities between the language and culture of the Zulus and the fictional Kukuana (Rider Haggard 2012). 14 Despite scholarly reservations regarding referencing Wikipedia, in this case I would argue it is quite justified, as the fan-based knowledge referenced here is of a type particularly well-suited to online user-generated content. 15 There was in fact a total eclipse of the sun two weeks earlier, on the 17th May 1882, though it would not have been visible from southern Africa (Espenak 2013). 91
All this is in contrast to the more plausible diegetic singing of the Zulu herdsmen during the nocturnal campfire scene as the explorers start their journey [0:07:30]. The herdsmen are out-of-shot for most of the scene and placed firmly in the background in relation to the foregrounded conversation between the three white characters. However, this is a rare moment of the presentation of African music in a social, rather than martial, context; it is, in fact, the first such moment in the oeuvre of South African film, if one discounts the Matabele’s martial threnody in Rhodes of Africa.16
Example 4: Zulu campfire song from King Solomon's Mines
Example 4 presents my transcription of this song.17 The song continues to repeat this phrase many times, continuing under the dialogue of Quartermain, Kathy and her father;
16 Always assuming as well that there is nothing of the sort in the 1933 ‘n Dogter van die Veld, which I have been unable to watch. 17 I extend my gratitude to Akhona Ndzuta, who deciphered the Zulu text from the poor-quality recording, and provided the translation, as well as all other translations from African languages 92 the solo call part provides slight variations on its basic melodic contour, while the group response repeats unchanged. The text translates as “All these people are carrying your weapon”. The filmmakers could hardly have expressly chosen the particular song, since coming from England, they would not be familiar with the options available regarding Zulu song; more likely, they instructed the singers to sing something appropriate to the scenario, and the singers selected the song. Since there is no way of knowing the circumstances under which the song was chosen, it is possible only to speculate about its meaning in this context, based on its metaphorical applicability to the current situation.
Assuming the song is relevant to the immediate circumstances, “All these people” could refer to the singers themselves, or to the filmmakers, or—within the scenario—to Quartermain and his two companions. “Your” could likewise refer to any of these groups. “All these people are carrying your weapon” could therefore mean, “We [the Zulu extras] are doing work on your [the filmmakers’] behalf”. Alternatively, it could mean, “These people [the filmmakers] are carrying our [the Zulu extras’] weapon”. This could suggest an expression of disempowerment—the filmmakers, or perhaps white power more generally, have taken their power or agency, leaving them no choice but to do as directed. The layers of African fantasy superimposed over African reality speak clearly of this disempowerment: as one of the very few accurate representations of African culture in the film, it is de-emphasized into a vague noise in the background.
Whatever the precise meaning of the song is, it functions as an encoded statement, providing a set of meanings that were most likely not part of the filmmakers’ vision, and which, judging by their background placement, were not considered relevant beyond their atmospheric potential. As a text in this sense, it can be read in much the same way as the workers’ song in African Jim:18 in both instances, onscreen performers are able to insert their own meaning encoded to a particular audience, the filmmakers unaware of the additional layers of meaning imposed on the scene.
throughout this study. In the current example, the solo call is too soft in relation to the chorus response to decipher the words. 18 See for instance Dovey and Impey (2010), discussed under “Film music” in Chapter 1. 93
The white characters appear in close-up round their fire, responding to the filmmakers’ directions for the scenario, which aim to characterize not simply the human characters but the land they are travelling through, which in the context of an adventure story such as this one is very much a character in its own right. In the distance behind and to the left is the Zulu herders’ fire, shown in the long-range shot before moving out-of-shot for the mid- range shot of the white characters. The white characters are explicitly presenting a fantasy version of their environment; the black characters, while on one level engaged in the fantasy, also present an underlying level of reality. They are on the fringes of the fantasy, and as such demonstrate the probable reality of their daily life—hard work, little pay and primarily treated as labour potential—in contrast to the fantasy of infinite riches and exotic tribesmen that the film is imposing on their home environment. As only one, Makubalo Hlubi as Kapse, is a credited actor, they are likely extras from geographically close locations rather than brought in from afar. Whatever the personal circumstances of these particular extras, they are acting as labour, which is the role white authority attempts to assign to black people not just in this scenario but in South African reality as well. Their song emphasizes this schism between fantasy and reality—they import part of their own store of cultural knowledge into the film, a slice of African reality cutting through the film’s African fantasy. While, therefore, on the surface the song supports the fantasy through providing a realistic and plausible musical performance, on closer examination the presence of the reality can overwhelm the fantasy, making it seem a facile and irrelevant conceit.
The African fantasy that is both supported and undermined by the song in Example 4 comes under further attack from the next diegetic cue attributed to the Zulu herders. Like Rhodes of Africa, Gaumont British Picture Corporation made this film. Although different composers scored the films, the musical director for both is Louis Levy, who was the musical director for all Gaumont British productions from 1933 onwards. This link becomes apparent in the next cue. Quartermain and his companions receive the map to King Solomon’s Mines from a dying explorer; after his death, Kapse and the other Zulu herders bury him. As they bury him, out-of-shot, they sing a funeral song [0:12:37]. This song is identical to the Matabele threnody sung at Rhodes’s funeral in Rhodes of Africa, shown in Example 3 above. It is not simply the same song, but the same recording, reused 94 here for a similar purpose, the “Bayete!” salute cut and the rest of the song looped for the duration of the scene—the looping is easy to achieve, since the song is designed as a series of repetitions of the same phrase.
Much of the visual and aural material depicting the Kukuana is recycled from the depictions of the Matabele in Rhodes of Africa. The talking drum sequence discussed in relation to that film is here recut, reusing some footage. The accompanying audio, on the other hand, is different: a slower but more intricate rhythm is used. But as the Kukuana lead Quartermain and his company to their kraal, they sing the same song the Matabele sang as they surround Rhodes’s ox wagon; this is the song used by Hubert Bath in his arrangement shown in Example 2 above. The Kukuana version, however, is a minor 3rd higher [Rhodes of Africa: 0:29:45; King Solomon’s Mines: 0:40:35]. The technology did not exist at that time to change pitch without modifying tempo; since the Kukuana version is at the same tempo but a different pitch, it was perhaps an out-take from Rhodes of Africa—recorded but not used. A further example of this recycling occurs for the mustering of the tribes in King Solomon’s Mines [1:04:20]. The Rhodes of Africa footage of the Matabele marching to the 1st Matabele War, and the accompanying diegetic song [1:01:00], is reused.
The reusing of material provides an informative commentary on the filmmakers’ and viewers’ perceptions of African culture, and on the filmic role it is coerced into playing. Viewers are encouraged to look away, to see only the broad palette of a series of set routines: dancing, attacking, escorting prisoners, occasionally partaking in scenes of village life. When individual tribesmen speak to one another, as at 0:41:10 in King Solomon’s Mines, no translation is provided, because they are not there to convey information, merely texture. We are encouraged by the setting to form the opinion that what the person is saying need not concern us; his utterances have no relevance.19 Despite the lack of subtitles, however, this particular utterance is in fact directly relevant to the
19 It is interesting that in this scene the blacksmith, to whom the comments are addressed, is first shown in medium shot using a metal mallet; a cut to a long shot then occurs, showing an assistant using a large rock as a hammer and the metal mallet nowhere in sight. The mallet was perhaps judged to be out of character with the depiction of the Kukuana, who are portrayed as primitive and drone-like. 95 story. The sound quality is not clear, but the man appears to be saying “Hey madoda! Niyawubona lomangaliso... ngaphambili... ngumangaliso”. This is in isiNdebele, and can be translated as “Hey, men! Come see this miracle... up ahead/in front... it's a miracle”, referring to the arrival of the white adventurers at the Kukuana village. As with the fiction of indigenous southern Africans of this period being unfamiliar with guns, the idea of their unfamiliarity with white people plays into European fantasies of Africa, in stark contrast with the reality of the period.
King Solomon’s Mines sets the scene for the urban-focussed films to follow a decade later. While these films partially move away from the fantasy of Africans as rural dwellers untouched by modern life, they continue to demonstrate a desire to engage with African aesthetics but not with the politics surrounding those aesthetics. This attitude predominates well into the 1960s. Paul Robeson, as the popular song-performing Kukuana chief, forms a bridge between these two filmic worlds: the popular songs he sings accompanied by the orchestral underscore are the first appearance of urban African popular music culture in South African film. The “African” element is filtered through African American culture, which is a vital element of black South African—or for that matter probably any—popular music post-1900.
Building a Nation (1938) Building a Nation, although ostensibly a history of the creation of the Union of South Africa, relates its narrative with minimal reference to the music of the indigenous cultures of the geographical area that would become this country. Intended for an international audience, its purpose was originally to promote tourism, an agenda that along the way morphed into a promotion of Afrikaner nationalism (Gutsche 1972: 350). It is thus strictly a history of white South Africa, which begins with the narrator writing off the black players in various ways as a justification of the white settlers’ dominion over the Cape and the people therein. According to the narration, the “Strandlopers”20 are “the most primitive of savage people”; the San “relics of the stone age, existing like baboons in their rock caves”;
20 The Oxford English Dictionary defines “Strandloper” as “[a] member of a people, related to the San and Koekhoe [Khoikhoi], living on the southern shores of South Africa from prehistoric times until the present millennium” (Oxford English Dictionary 2016c). It translates from Dutch or Afrikaans as “beach walker”. 96 while the Khoikhoi are “people mid-way between the copper and iron ages” who were “dirty but cheerful. In addition to a weakness for strong drink they were fond of thieving and were destined to constitute the white man’s first ‘native problem’”.
As with the other films from the 1930s discussed already, the focus purely on white protagonists dictates the approach to African music, which is unwaveringly diegetic. Much more so than these earlier films however, the use of diegetic African music is overtly propagandistic, denotatively as opposed to merely connotatively. The film uses music, in conjunction with voice-over narration, to actively construct the representation of those to whom it attributes the music.
The San’s music and dancing are wielded as evidence that they are representative of, as described by the film’s narration, “man in his most primitive form—untouched by any civilizing influence, they were the embodiment of the spirit of a vast, dark continent”. The narration accompanies a scene of their music and dancing, as apparent proof of this statement. Ironically, for identical reasons (worded more favourably) their music has more recently often been held in high regard—as a means of encountering some level of deep, fundamental subconscious meaning lost through the distractions of contemporary existence. The following quote expresses this viewpoint:
This indicates the ancient and sacred nature of Bushman21 music. It doesn't resonate with modern sensibilities, but rather deep within the heart, with a raw and hallowed essence that is common to all Life. (Wheeler 2013)
The narrative of Building a Nation revolves fundamentally around Western attitudes of the time about what constituted “civilization”. Scenes of modern, international communication by means of telegraph and mechanized, industrial gold-mining highlight the country’s technological development. The San are judged through the context of a Modernist vision of industrial “progress”. This model of “civilization” having been at least ideologically laid to rest, the tables have turned on Building a Nation‘s representative model. To the contemporary viewer, the footage of the San is more likely to be intriguing,
21 See footnote 12 on page 22 regarding this term. 97 their music resonating with aesthetic and humanistic value, while the voice-over narration is barbaric in its ignorance and arrogance.22
Slavery in the Cape Colony at the beginning of the 18th century23 is addressed as a constructive means to an end of “building a nation”, in which everyone is awarded their proper place in society that will best enable them to contribute to the Afrikaner nationalist vision. The film makes this argument through music to represent the vision of benign slavery; the “happy” slaves sing a merry working song, accompanied by lute. Example 5 presents a transcription of the song. The film’s playback quality is unfortunately too poor to ascertain the words, though they seem to be in Afrikaans rather than Dutch.24 The accents of the singers are those of current-day Cape Coloured Afrikaans speakers. This may have been seen as a convenient and economical option, since the ancestry of the Cape Coloured population can be partially traced back to migrant slaves, making them a seemingly appropriate choice as actors to play such roles. But it also has the effect of cementing race relations and perceptions at the time of the film’s production, both taking for granted and also reinforcing master/servant relationships between whites and coloureds. I continue this argument in the discussion of Simon Beyers below.
22 Wilhelm Worringer’s 1908 theory of “abstraction and empathy” serves as an analogue of these shifts in attitude (Worringer 2014). Worringer proposed that cultural production developed, along with the increasing sophistication of its creators, from the creation of abstract, geometrical figures through empathetic, naturalistic portrayals of the world and thence finally back to abstraction, but now in a more sophisticated, informed manner. In a similar vein, societal attitudes towards what are perceived, rightly or wrongly, as “fundamental” forms of knowledge and culture are now generally more widely appreciated than they were under the “progress” model. 23 The scene depicting the slaves includes Willem Adriaan van der Stel in his capacity of Governor, placing the date between 1699 and 1707. 24 One could question why the music of foreign slaves should be discussed under the heading “African music”; the importance of Cape slaves’ music to the subsequent development of uniquely South African styles justifies this inclusion. 98
Example 5: Slaves' song from Building a Nation [0:26:16]
According to the narration, “these slaves were not unhappy; in the main they were a cheerful and well-fed band of workers, devoted to their masters, and their happy nature found expression in music and song”.25 This argument, presented here in 1938, was used during the apartheid era as well—a people’s own cultural production is used to create a model of representation that dehumanizes them.26 The logic is perhaps that if people can produce such happy music while being treated so poorly, they clearly do not feel the same gamut of emotions or have the same physical needs as their masters. The masters, finding themselves in that same position, after all, would be less happy. Therefore, sub-human is acceptable: the expression of happiness endorses the treatment they receive as the type of treatment they desire. Already in the 19th century African American former slave Frederick Douglass addressed this argument, which appears to have also been common in the USA:
The remark in the olden times was not unfrequently made, that slaves were the most contented and happy laborers in the world, and their dancing and singing were referred to in proof of this alleged fact; but it was a great mistake to suppose them happy because they sometimes
25 There is no shortage of evidence to discredit this self-serving narrative; see for instance the accounts of criminal trials at South African History Online2 (no date) taken from the legal records of the Dutch East India Company, which are now held in the Cape Archives, recounting poor treatment including savage and gratuitous beatings. 26 See for instance the 1959 Sunday Times review of Come Back, Africa (quoted in Davis (1996a: 58)) complaining of the perceived one-sidedness of director Lionel Rogosin’s portrayal of South Africa: “There are only stark misery, domineering policemen and debauched, pathetic shebeen scenes, with nothing of the laughter and smiles of street corner kwela players”. Kwela is a fast, pennywhistle-based style of music associated with South African township youth, which came to prominence in the 1950s and 1960s (see Kubik (no date)). 99
made those joyful noises. The songs of the slaves represented their sorrows, rather than their joys. Like tears, they were a relief to aching hearts…. Sorrow and desolation have their songs, as well as joy and peace. (2003: 32)
Despite the propagandistic representation of slaves, the filmmakers have arguably reconstructed slave music of the period with some plausibility. Martin (2013: 70, quoting de Kock (1950: 92)) recounts that “as far back as 1676… Abraham Van Riebeeck… was entertained at the Governor’s residence by a black steward and another young slave who played the harp and the lute”. Dances were a popular entertainment and thus a staple musical form: “Amongst the wealthy who had young folks in the house, dance was a regular past-time [sic]. The orchestra on such occasions was supplied by the slaves who were excellent musicians” (Martin 2013: 70, quoting Botha 1970: 51). These quotes refer to slave performances for the entertainment of the wealthy, not for the entertainment of the slaves themselves as they go about their daily labours, as depicted in the film sequence. According to Worden (2010: 99) “little is known… of the kinds of entertainment which slaves provided for themselves”. But the song in Example 5, aside from being accompanied by lute, has a distinct dance quality, with its 6/8 rhythm and call-and-response pattern. Further research would be required to determine whether this song could plausibly have been played by slaves at the end of the 17th century.
The central portion of Building a Nation’s narrative covers the conflict between settlers and the Nguni27 people. One such scene starkly contrasts comfortable, homely Europe with savage Africa through diegetic music [0:36:50] to achieve its settler-biased interpretation. An English settler couple sit at their dining table a few days before Christmas, toying with their daughter’s gift, a music box. The box plays a nostalgic, sweet yet melancholy tune, as the couple reminisce over the pleasures of Christmas in the European winter (the music box is quite reminiscent of the mbira, somewhat ironically in the context of the scene). This signifier of European society at its most vulnerable, when
27 As defined by the Oxford English Dictionary, the Nguni are “a subdivision of the southern Bantu- speaking peoples, living mainly in southern Africa, all of whom have a common historical origin and speak closely related languages”, “comprising Xhosa, Zulu, Siswati (Swazi), and Ndebele” (Oxford English Dictionary 2016b). 100 it is most open to engaging in “goodwill to all men”, as a placard produced by the wife proclaims, is interrupted by distant singing. At first mistaken for “carol singers”, the singers turn out to be a Xhosa raiding party.28 During their attack, a Xhosa warrior carelessly smashes the music box, and its merry tune is replaced by the raiding party’s singing as they burn the house down. The music box is replete with meaning, brought out through its treatment by both sides. With its sentimental tune, its purpose as a gift for their daughter, and its complex mechanical workings, it characterizes the settlers as peace loving, family-oriented and civilized. The Xhosa, by contrast, place no value on the music box, marking them as the polar opposites of these traits: unlike its cheery sound, the sound of their singing is frightening, emerging out of the night as the precursor to disaster. Their singing is presented as the sound of dehumanized savagery, of wanton destruction.
Throughout the course of the narrative, the Zulu are carefully and gradually constructed as the fearsome but worthy foe who will eventually be defeated. According the Zulu with a certain degree of respect, especially in relation to the opinions offered of other societal groups, makes the Boer victory more meaningful and glorious. Music and dance are integral to this construction of the Zulu as foe. This narrative thread in the film begins as far back as the late 17th century, where precolonial Nguni are shown singing and dancing, “happy and peaceful; the Zulu nation had not yet arisen” [0:23:38]. Young women dance, rhythmically accompanied by the hand clapping of those gathered around the dancers. Scenes of women harvesting corn are interspersed with the dancing. The rural idyll and musical accompaniment serve to contrast with the later martial dance and music of the Zulu, who are introduced with a montage of Shaka ordering the execution of a prisoner. Unprecedented for a black character, and marking him (or rather the Zulu nation which he represents) as of unusual importance to the narrative, Shaka receives his own extra-diegetic orchestral underscore theme, transcribed in Example 6. The cue incorporates certain features signifying Africanness. The hemitonic pentatonic29 scale with a flattened 7th degree and the use of 3rd-less chords consisting of bare 5ths and octaves are the two primary
28 That they are Xhosa can be inferred from the date, 1835, together with the implied proximity to Grahamstown, making this event part of the Sixth Frontier War. 29 In other words, a five-note scale which includes at least one semitone. 101 features giving the passage its exotic30 character. Such techniques are familiar from depictions of Native Americans, as categorized by Burnand and Sarnaker (1999) and Gorbman (2000), for instance.
Example 6: Shaka's theme from Building a Nation
Commonly in filmic depictions of the Zulu, characterization does not take place through conversation or other forms of personal human interaction, other than with the leader figure. As Davis (1996a: 148) points out, “the Zulu warriors are depersonalised. There are no attempts to create characters”. Characterization takes place en masse through music and dance, as with the citizens of Dingaan’s kraal. Firstly, Dingaan is shown singing and dancing with his many mistresses, establishing his heathen credentials, a reading encouraged by the local missionary’s dialogue with his translator bemoaning his lack of success winning converts. Later, when Piet Retief and his retinue arrive, the Zulu warriors sing en masse. This is ostensibly peaceful on the first two occasions, but is a trope inevitably tied to aggression, ending here with the massacre of Retief and his men. Thus, as with the film’s earlier diegetic portrayals of San music, slave music, Xhosa music and Western music, the portrayal of Zulu music is fundamentally political, characterizing the Zulu as violent heathen.
30 The term “exotic” is used here in the sense in which Locke (2011) uses it, namely to refer to the incorporation of non-Western influences into Western, specifically orchestral, contexts, typically for colouristic purposes. 102
Simon Beyers (1947) The plot structure and other elements of Simon Beyers31 (1947 dir. Pierre de Wet), including its extra-diegetic underscore, are discussed in Chapter 5. At this point, I will discuss only a single scene: the only scene incorporating African music, in the form of a group of slaves singing.
As Gertruide lies dying from a long illness, in the Cape Dutch house that is the centre of most of the action, diegetic singing is heard off-screen, outside the house [1:38:48]. Simon Beyers tells Gertruide, “Luister, die slawe sing vir jou ‘n liedjie” [Listen, the slaves are singing a song for you]. This sequence raises some interesting points.
Firstly, the film is set in 1688.32 At this time, the slave population in the Cape would have consisted of imported slaves from Madagascar, Mozambique, Malaysia, Indonesia and India, with a very limited number from Angola and Guinea (South African History Online2: no date; Ross 2010: 177). Slaves at this stage were imported because Van Riebeeck’s orders were to maintain peace with, and not enslave, the local population (Beck 2014:36). Aside from the incongruity of the film’s depiction of the slaves, who physically resemble Khoisan, an even more incongruous factor is that their singing seems to be Nguni. The Nguni were never slaves in the Cape, and as Beck states above, the Khoisan were not enslaved or indentured at this point. Example 7 provides a transcription of the song.
31 Simon Beyers is an adaptation of the play Die Goeie Oue Tyd (1944) by Sita (Hauptfleisch 2011). Sita is the pseudonym of Sara Susanna de Kock (1898-1967) (Terblanche 2012). A plot summary of Simon Beyers is available at M-Net Corporate (2015). 32 The film merely gives the date as “teen die einde van die 17e eeu” [at the end of the 17th century]. The catalyst for the action of the film, however, namely the sending of Dutch orphans to the Cape, is based on an actual event, that of orphan girls arriving in 1688 to bolster the population of settlers at the Cape (Ball 2007). 103
Example 7: Slave song from Simon Beyers
This song, then, demonstrates the film’s central purpose as Afrikaner-nationalist myth- building. In most respects, the film makes some attempt at period accuracy. Yet the slaves are of Khoisan and Nguni extraction: Khoisan in appearance, Nguni in culture. The film places the population groups yoked into servitude at the time of production (a year before apartheid came formally into being) in the role of slave. The film therefore perpetuates the 104 myth of the inevitability of then-contemporary social relations through attempting to replicate them back in time. This may be through ignorance and assumption rather than an explicit agenda, but this would be because the myths were already part of the filmmakers’ worldview, who would have considered such myths a truth of their society. The lack of care applied to this particular aspect of the production is similar to that of King Solomon’s Mines and Rhodes of Africa, which use the same footage and music to represent two distinct cultures, one fictional, the other real. In those cases, imperialism was the controlling narrative: explicitly in Rhodes of Africa, implicitly in King Solomon’s Mines. Here it is proto-apartheid paternal nationalism.
The slaves sing the song outside the window, grieving for their mistress. The emotional connection flows entirely in one direction, however; while the slaves are paralyzed with grief, they are excluded from the family’s grief and other social structures. The family take their song for granted and barely acknowledge it: as with the herders’ song in King Solomon’s Mines, it is forced into the background as a representation of natives’ place in patriarchal society.
As mentioned, the slaves of this period were not native; the film, however, is not commenting on the status of non-native slaves, but on the status of black servants in 1940s South Africa. A strong sense of apathy dominates the cue’s construction, which is apparent on at least three levels. Firstly, there is the apathy of the filmmakers, who take for granted the ethnic origins of the slaves and demonstrate a lack of interest in the choice of music used to represent them.33 Secondly, there is the apathy of the white characters, who barely bother to acknowledge the emotional tribute of the slaves. The third level of apathy is the implicit assumption that the slaves would mourn the passing of their delicate, Aryan mistress. While from one perspective incorporating the music may appear progressive, giving voice to African culture at a time when it was repressed, on closer inspection the cue reinforces attitudes of white superiority through its careless assumptions about both music and performers. It writes off the possibility that a musical contribution from the African characters could be an aesthetically relevant statement.
33 The ethnicity of the slaves could also be read as purposeful historical revisionism. 105
The film normalizes intensive exploration of the feelings and emotions of the white characters, while depicting the slaves as having no existence outside their deep concern in the emotional lives of the white characters. Their only moment of song is for their mistress’s benefit, not their own. The representation of their devotion to Gertruide through song helps to legitimize the exclusive focus on the emotional and social lives of the masters by demonstrating the slaves’ supposed willing participation in this hierarchy.
Trends in the use of African music in the 1930s and 1940s The early period of sound film demonstrates a strong agenda in its use of African music. Although used to build a representational model of the music’s creators, the real purpose of this model is to characterize the white protagonists through their interactions with those represented. The slaves’ songs from Building a Nation and Simon Beyers are clear examples of this phenomenon. The songs are not included as expressions of the slaves’ own cultures primarily (the ethnicity of the slaves is never discussed and is obfuscated in both cases by the interaction of visual and aural contexts). Instead, their function is to argue for the fairness of patriarchal white rule, emphasizing the supposedly childlike nature of the slaves in their happy, carefree attitudes in Building a Nation and their naïve emotional neediness and attachment to their masters in Simon Beyers. Without exception, African music in this period is diegetic—at least when performed, or supposedly performed, by African musicians. There are examples, such as at the beginning of Rhodes of Africa, of “African” music incorporated extra-diegetically as what Slobin (2008) would call “assumed vernacular”, where African music is reworked for orchestral instruments. This objectifies the subjects, examining them from a distance, outside the context of the emotional narrative created by the extra-diegetic underscore. The latter, in contrast, encourages perceivers’ empathy for the central characters.
The most prevalent use of African music during this period is the accompaniment or signification of warlike behaviour. Scenes of Nguni warriors (Zulu, Xhosa, Matabele, “Kukuana”) performing war-related songs and chants, accompanied by dancing either in battle line-up or for display in a kraal setting, dominate. Such scenes remain prominent in later years: Untamed (1955 dir. Henry King) and Zulu (1964 dir. Cy Endfield) both feature such sequences extensively; indeed, they are extensions through time of the respective 106 narratives of Afrikaner nationalism and British imperialism embodied in Building a Nation, Rhodes of Africa and King Solomon’s Mines. In neither Untamed nor Zulu is there any characterization of individual Zulu characters: both characterize them en masse, and they are always portrayed as almost whimsically aggressive.
The 1950s to 1960s The 1950s sees a shift from historical, rural narratives to contemporary narratives, primarily of the urban environment. This necessarily results in a comparable shift away from rural African forms towards African and Western popular music. Two factors account for this shift. Firstly, the creation of African Jim demonstrated to mainstream producers, predominantly African Film Productions, that there was profit in exploitation of cultural activities taking place in black communities, activities whose existence prior to this film was virtually unknown in white communities.34 Thus, the contemporary urban environment of black South Africans made its way into mainstream South African film for the first time in a series of productions in the early 1950s. Secondly, after the 1948 victory of the National Party, Afrikaner nationalism was the dominant power. The need to canvas support through propagandistic historical accounts was now secondary to affirming the vision of the new order of society. In this new vision, the role of black South Africans had changed. They were no longer the foe in narratives of taming the land, which was now sufficiently tamed. Instead, their role as contributors to the new society had to be clearly delineated: it was now more important to consolidate their image as workforce instead of warriors. The portrayal of black South Africans in the 1950s therefore appears paradoxical: one body of film displays black South African talent, while another consolidates their image as servants and manual labourers. The historical frontier film, with accompanying stereotype of Zulu warriors singing en masse prior to attacking the laager, is relegated to the likes of the Twentieth Century Fox production Untamed.35
34 See Davis (1996a). 35 The sudden Hollywood interest in South African history is likely related to Twentieth Century Fox’s South African business interests: Untamed was released a year prior to the company’s takeover of Schlesinger’s African Consolidated Films and African Consolidated Theatres in 1956 (see Tomaselli 1988: 159). 107
African music in a rural context returns to prominence in a handful of films from the 1960s: most especially, in Dingaka (1964 dir. Jamie Uys), The Naked Prey (1966 dir. Cornel Wilde) and The Jackals (1967 dir. Robert D. Webb). These films, together with Come Back, Africa, discussed in Chapter 4, set a new precedent for the foregrounding of African music. Less extensive examples occur in Die Jagters (1960 dir. Gordon Vorster) and Kimberley Jim (1963 dir. Emil Nofal).
In these films, African music first finds its way into the extra-diegetic underscore, thus functioning as an integral element of the filmmakers’ aesthetic vision, rather than in the quasi-documentary, objectified manner inherent of diegetic music. Come Back, Africa is the pioneer in this regard; it is also unusual in that it largely superimposes rural styles of music onto the urban environment. Regarding films for South African mainstream film audience consumption, Sam Sklair’s score to Die Jagters is the first to introduce an extra- diegetic use of African music, albeit in one short and ambiguous scene. These films undergo a further shift in the conceptualization of African music: unlike earlier films, which exclusively used African music diegetically to characterize African peoples, there is now a move towards not just extra-diegetic music use but the use of African music to characterize African landscapes. A connection is forged, then, between the land itself and the cultural production of its indigenous inhabitants. This has the potential to reconceptualize films’ thematic and expressive focus away from the subjective, Romantic approach to scoring biased towards the emotional experiences of predominantly Western characters. This would allow space for a more “objective” approach, decentralizing the Western characters, their role as outsiders emphasized in relation to the land, which then becomes the central character. The Jackals begins to move towards such a conceptualization.
Dingaka (1964) Dingaka’s use of African music is extensive and foregrounded. It is also entirely diegetic.36 Continuing the tradition of earlier films, African music is, with one or two notable
36 The only exception is the title cue over the opening credits, but this is simply a shorter version (the same recording, but with editing cuts) of the climactic dance cue that culminates in Haqeba’s death. 108 exceptions, reserved for the accompaniment of scenes of mass community activities, such as funerals or celebrations. Nevertheless, it is in some ways pioneering in its use of African music, as will be demonstrated. The mediated character of the music characterizes it most strongly, however. Commentators have noted how, in order to achieve popularity, films that deal with specifically black perspectives, such as the struggle against apartheid, must mediate the experience of the black characters through the experience of a white protagonist.37 Cry Freedom (1987 dir. Richard Attenborough) and A Dry White Season (1989 dir. Euzhan Palcy) are explicit, though later, examples of this phenomenon. Dingaka‘s score demonstrates a similar phenomenon more than twenty years prior to these films. While African music plays a major part in the narrative, Bertha Egnos is its credited composer,38 with songs by Egnos and Eddie Domingo, and choral arrangements by Basil Grey.39 With so many overlapping music credits, all applying to African music, it is difficult to establish with certainty who did what; clearly, though, the African music was written by non-African musicians.40 The score’s African component is therefore mediated through the cultural experience of one or more white composers. This fact manifests itself musically in a number of ways. It is productive to examine these in closer detail, as there are implications regarding representation.
Certain cues, while incorporating elements generally associated with African music, are structurally designed according to a Western musical framework. The title cue, for instance, is unerringly pentatonic, until its penultimate note, and uses African drums and African voices, with syncopation spread liberally throughout; yet it is clearly conceived as a composition in the concert music sense. This is apparent in its teleological narrative arc, building from a single drumbeat up to a multi-layered choral texture before gradually
37 See for instance the interview with Euzhan Palcy in the documentary In Darkest Hollywood, and Tomaselli (2006: 101). 38 Egnos is perhaps best known as the creator of the 1977 musical Ipi Ntombi, for which she wrote the music. Further biographical information is available at Soul Safari (2010). 39 In addition to these credits for what amounts to the diegetic music, Stephen O’Reilly is credited for the orchestral underscore. 40 However, Presentation of National Orders (2005) states that Sophie Mgcina “wrote music for Jamie Uys’s Dingaka, one of the first South African films to achieve international recognition”. This appears to be a misinterpretation of the film’s credited cast, where she is listed as “Choir Soloist” (Soul Safari 2010). She also appears as a performer in the film Dilemma (1962) (discussed in Chapter 4), two years prior to Dingaka’s release. See also footnote 44 below. 109 reverting to a single solo female voice that provides a cadence figure (using the afore- mentioned non-pentatonic note). This narrative arc is constructed through the gradual development of motivic figures, which tends to occur in patterns of four-bar phrases, very much a conventional feature of Western art music. There is also a tendency towards the use of devices such as canon [for instance 0:39:20, as the stick fighters climb the mine dump]. These appear in a specifically Western round-like conceptualization rather than in the type of call-and-response framework common in, for instance, Zulu vocal music: only context and performers suggest an African musical provenance. This underlying Western influence instils a generic quality to the “African” music: it is replete with signifiers of Africa, but lacks the specificity to locate the music within a specific cultural sphere of influence.
In this sense, the musical representation is closely analogous to the film’s representation of black subjects more generally, as it attempts to represent both everyone and no one simultaneously through the device of the fictional tribe. The stereotyped orgiastic dance scene at the end thus simultaneously stereotypes all groups; but since it represents no group in particular, there is no recourse for claiming it is an inaccurate reflection of any one group, since it does not expressly claim to be representing any such group, but rather a fictional culture. Thus the stereotype can be perpetuated, remaining largely unchanged in relation to stereotypes from thirty years previously in the likes of King Solomon’s Mines [0:49:30] and Song of Freedom (1936 dir. J. Elder Wills)41 [0:59:45].
The film credits Egnos for “original African music”, though the term “original” is ambiguous, as it gives no indication as to whether all the African music is “original” and thus written by her, or whether some of it is pre-existing, as is indeed the case. After the “witch doctor”, Haqeba, kills Ntuku’s wife Rurani, the entire village takes part in a funeral procession, singing as they walk. They sing the Venda domba dance, the dance of the premarital initiation school for young women (Blacking 1969a: 4). The singing accompanying this dance is called u tivha khulo, “an unusual style of singing in which each
41 The UK production Song of Freedom, also starring Paul Robeson, has quite striking similarities to Dingaka: in both, an agent from the Western world wishes to expose the African tribe’s witch doctor as a fraud, thus freeing the people from superstition; and both culminate in lavish, orgiastic dance scenes in which the “civilizer” successfully faces off with the witch doctor. 110 person sings only one or two tones, and sometimes in a falsetto style that resembles yodelling” (1969a: 12). U tivha khulo is a vocal equivalent of tshikona, the Venda reed music where each performer plays a single-note reed pipe:
The sound of khulo,42 and even the technique of production, is a vocal transformation of the music of tshikona, the national reed-pipe dance, in which twenty-four or more pipes, tuned to different tones of a heptatonic scale, are played in consort in hocket style. (Blacking 1969b: 257)
The Dingaka version is very similar to Blacking’s own recording of khulo.43 Its function in the fictional filmic narrative is quite different however. It is placed in a funereal context, while in actual practice it is concerned with the beginning, rather than the end, of the life cycle: “[t]he domba dance… is intended to symbolize both the mystical act of sexual communion, conception, the growth of the foetus, and child-birth” (1969b: 216).
Dingaka was criticized on release for indiscriminately mingling elements from different South African cultures, regarding dress and language particularly (see Davis 1996a: 66): it is purposely non-specific in its creation of a fictional African people, the Makungwe (a device reminiscent of the fictional Kukuana of King Solomon’s Mines). As noted already, this cultural non-specificity is very much a feature of the music as well. Prior to the Venda domba music, Ntuku’s family sings “Thula”, a Xhosa lullaby, as they work [approximately 0:18:30].44 The musical bow played by Mpudi as he and Ntuku leave for the city [approximately 0:27:00] is most likely the Venda dende. It is a braced gourd bow tuned
42 Blacking does not use italics for Venda words in his English prose; I retain his approach when quoting him, but otherwise follow the convention of italicizing non-English words not part of everyday English usage. 43 This recording is available on the website of the University of Washington’s School of Music (see Jezek et al. 2015, track 19). 44 “Thula Thula” tends to be interchangeably ascribed to both Xhosa and Zulu culture. While it is most commonly described as Zulu, see for instance Alfred Lerofolo’s comments in Mooki (2012). The song was recently involved in a lawsuit over copyright ownership. Gallo Music claimed the song was written in the 1960s by Bertha Egnos, Eddie Domingo and Basil Grey—the composers/arrangers for Dingaka, though the link to the film appears not to have been explicitly stated—while Joe Theron maintained the song was traditional (Child 2012). The case ended in an out-of-court settlement in favour of Gallo Music (Dube 2013). It is not clear whether this settlement implies that Egnos et al. are actually the composers, or simply that there is no formal record of an earlier composer. 111 with fundamentals a minor 3rd apart, corresponding in tuning to recordings of this instrument by John Blacking (see Jezek et al. 2015, track 9) and Jaco Kruger (see ILAM Jaco Kruger Cassettes (no date), “Benzi hero ra todza zwa mai”).45 Heralding Haqeba’s appearance prior to the climactic dance scene, the dancers sing “Shosholoza”, originally an Ndebele migrant labourers’ song [approximately 1:24:30]. The filmmakers thus decontextualize and recontextualize music from a variety of cultures as they see fit.
Various implications regarding representation arise from this indiscriminate commingling of diverse, decontextualized cultural elements. Some writers consider the approach unproblematic. Tomaselli considers the film to have a “deeper sociological significance”, agreeing with film critic John van Zyl’s 1964 review that, “[i]t hardly matters that an impression of an African Tribe was created which can be faulted by ethnologists” (quoted in 1988: 134). Tomaselli also quotes Mtutuzeli Matchoba’s 1979 description of the film as an
… honest attempt to represent the controversial traditional theme. A picture may not be especially intended for a particular population group, but because that group recognizes itself authentically represented within the theme, it will respond positively to it. (Quoted in 1988: 203)
For these writers, then, the film’s underlying aim outweighs issues of cultural accuracy. One could argue this opinion is symptomatic of the extent to which both the conventions of film and of political life had inured audiences to an expectation of reasonable representation of black South African characters in filmic discourse—since it happens so seldom, expectations are low, and audiences are willing to overlook such problems. In a sense, musically Dingaka is a step back from African Jim46 of fifteen years previously: while that film expressed a certain paternalism, it did so on a social rather than musical level, the musicians nevertheless presenting their own musical voice. Dingaka, on the other hand, expresses its paternalism musically through its mediation of African musical practice by white composers. Representationally, the result is a perpetuation of the colonial
45 On the Jaco Kruger recording, the interval is actually somewhere between a major 2nd and a minor 3rd, and is thus open to interpretation. 46 Discussed in Chapter 4. 112 relationship in which the colonized are not permitted to speak for themselves or formulate their own self-image, both voice and image being mediated through or supplied by the colonizers.
Musically, perhaps Dingaka‘s most pioneering element is its inclusion of socially intimate forms of African music, accompanying scenes which themselves offer more intimate depictions of African social life than have appeared before in South African film. These depictions include the musical bow47 and a type of lamellophone (depicted here with sixteen keys, though the one seen is not necessarily the one heard, which is equally true of the bow), played by an inmate in the crowded jail holding cell Ntuku is placed in. This scene creates a poignant contrast between precolonial African life and life under apartheid: the lamellophone conjures up a time prior to dangerous manual labour, poverty and oppression, in striking opposition to the harsh and hopeless environment of the jail cell. Through the transplanting of the gentle, contemplative and introverted sound of this instrument and its accompanying singing to the brutal, bare and impersonal locale of the crowded prison, this cue cuts to the heart of the central issue of this film, which is the contrast for black South Africans between rural and urban ways of being.
Dingaka represents a mixed bag regarding use of African music and its function in the representation of black South African peoples. On the one hand, mediation through the cultural lens of the white composers credited with its composition and arrangement results in a generic, decontextualized approach, either through the creation of new “African” music, tending towards abstracted use of musical signifiers of Africanness, or through the repurposing of existing African music for new filmic contexts. The result is an approach to representation that permits perpetuation of stereotyping and paternalism. On the other hand, it is not reasonable to judge the filmmakers, including Uys and Egnos, overly harshly in terms of current attitudes. For its time, the film commits itself to an unprecedented foregrounding of African peoples, their concerns and their music, the like of which had
47 As mentioned, it is probably the Venda dende, based on the tuning. The Zulu umakhweyana, another braced gourd bow, is also a possibility, though the standard tuning of the two sides of the string a tone apart, rather than a minor 3rd,, makes this less likely (see Mandela 2005: 48). 113 only previously appeared in the banned protest films Come Back, Africa and Dilemma.48 It also pioneers new forms of musical representation, offering a more nuanced portrait of African social life through inclusion of instruments associated with more intimate social environments, particularly the musical bow and the lamellophone.
The Naked Prey (1966) The Naked Prey is very self-aware in its use of African music: the opening credits state that “[t]he music in this motion picture is African music, played by Africans on African instruments”. This trend is a continuation of Dingaka’s practice of providing a specific credit for African music. The Naked Prey builds on this practice, explicitly pointing out the authenticity of the music (in contrast to Dingaka’s score by white South Africans) and shifting the African music into extra-diegetic space, in contrast to Dingaka’s purely diegetic treatment. However, on closer examination “African music, played by Africans” turns out to be not quite what it seems. Director Cornel Wilde49 devoted some time to making field recordings of rural music performances around South Africa, a selection of which appear on the soundtrack album for the film (see Various Artists 1966). The actual film uses very few of these recordings, however, and then always diegetically. The opening credits song is a re-recording of one of these songs by the actors playing the warriors/hunters. In the village scene after the capture of the safari, the celebratory music includes music of the Venda tshikona. While Dingaka recontextualized the domba for funereal purposes, The Naked Prey recontextualizes the tshikona to create a festive spirit, the sound of the reeds taking on the role almost of party horns. Visually, the drums in this scene are also Venda, following the convention of the large ngoma, the slightly smaller thungwa and the numerous thigh-held murumba drums, all played by women (Blacking 1995: 19-20). Judging by its aural similarity to the later extra-diegetic drumming, the drumming in the early parts of this sequence is not one of the field recordings, but is played by Andrew Tracey’s group. Aside from occasional diegetic singing, Tracey’s group
48 I do not include African Jim, The Magic Garden, Zonk, Song of Africa and Cry, the Beloved Country as precedents, since all except the last purposefully skirt real social issues, while Cry, the Beloved Country engages with such issues but includes only cursory moments of African music. 49 Wilde was an American who had a long Hollywood career principally as an actor, becoming involved in directing in the latter half of his career. 114 accounts for the remainder of the score, recorded by him and other cast members of the South African musical revue Wait a Minim!, who while performing in London were asked by Wilde to record for the film (Tracey’s written statement from the 2007 DVD release). Tracey recalls that
In addition to the problem of playing the instruments in sync with the screen, I remember that Cornel always wanted the drumming to speed up, to add excitement. We found this a challenge because African drumming normally hits a tempo and then sticks solidly to it.
“African music, played by Africans” is thus only loosely true: the music uses African instruments, but is predominantly the American Wilde’s free interpretation of African drumming adapted to the action of the film, played by South Africans, but not by Africans per se.
The narrative around the music instils certain expectations then, which are in practice not very satisfactorily met. The principal expectation is that the film will use African musicians and the material resources of African music to create a narrative extra-diegetic score fulfilling the physical and psychological roles typically found in a Hollywood film score. This is achieved to a limited extent, but is undermined by a focus purely on percussion, particularly the one-dimensional, predominantly physical conception of the relation between percussion and visuals. When people run, the drums beat hard and fast; when they walk stealthily, the drums beat slowly and ominously. Tracey refers to his group’s use of more varied timbral resources during recording:
We also used other traditional African instruments for effects in certain sections—several kinds of rattles, bows, bells, xylophones, mbiras, and others. For instance at one point, the hero is suffering from the heat of the sun: the sonic embodiment of that effect was produced on the South African one-string umakhweyana bow.
Some of these instruments are evident, but their use is severely curtailed; the use of the umakhweyana to convey the impression of heatwaves is effective, but lasts no longer than two seconds. A xylophone is used in its bass register to provide an impression of heavy plodding as the protagonist (played by Wilde, and only referred to as The Man) staggers through the sweltering heat. But its percussive, rhythmic element is exclusively favoured 115 at the expense of its melodic element: two mid/low-register notes a minor 3rd apart are struck at a slow tempo, behaving more like a drum than a xylophone. The mbira is used in a steady repeated-note rhythm to accompany the dripping of milk from a euphorbia, a metaphor for the dripping blood of the hunter that The Man has just killed.50 As with the xylophone, it is limited to a rhythmic rather than melodic use, and as with the umakhweyana lasts no more than a few seconds; a more interesting, though diegetic, appearance of the mbira occurs later as The Man steals food from a village at night. The result then is a rather dry score, its use of percussion at first novel and interesting but soon becoming predictable and monotonous.
The foregrounding of percussion as the central force of the film score is, however, pioneering; while such an approach was rare (possibly unprecedented) in the 1960s, Hollywood film scores today, especially in the action genre, are frequently heavily percussive. Large, typically Japanese taiko, drums, drive action sequences: orchestral accompaniment is often in thrall to percussion, the earlier Wagnerian style of complex contrapuntal writing replaced by a more homophonic, rhythmically accented style. A rock- influenced riff-based approach of repetition of short, rhythmical phrases replaces the through-composed approach of the earlier style. Perhaps Wilde’s decision to focus on African percussion as the basis for the extra-diegetic score provided the impetus for this approach.
As Prince (2007) points out in the audio commentary to the film, The Naked Prey is a strange mixture of the progressive and the clichéd, simultaneously providing an unusually nuanced portrait of black South Africans on film51 while relying on Hollywood clichés of cannibalism and exotic tortures. The village scene in which the safari members are gruesomely dispatched plays to these clichés, and as with Dingaka, the mix of the generic and the particular allows the perpetuation of these clichés. The film avoids specific claims
50 Interestingly, Dingaka makes use of this exact same plant dripping milk as a metaphor for the shedding of tears by Ntuku for his family. The musical representation of the dripping of blood also has precedents: Arnold Schoenberg creates a similar effect in his 1909 monodrama Erwartung. 51 The narrative does not explicitly locate itself in South Africa, despite its filming location, encounter with Venda speakers and use of South African actors; aside from cues of vegetation and culture, it seems to aim for a generic Africa rather than a specific South Africa. This is consistent with the propensity towards allegory evident in the nameless characters. 116 about the customs of any one group while providing a lacquer of authenticity through the inclusion of real but decontextualized elements from particular cultures; musically this is achieved through Venda reed and drumming music.
The Naked Prey does touch on contemporary issues pertinent to South Africa, such as ownership of land, especially regarding legitimacy of black and white claims to land—the safari financier’s apartheid-style refusal to recognize the rights of blacks to own land is the catalyst for the manhunt. But the very concept and scenario of the film seems misguided given its filming location and its production at the height of apartheid—a film about the threat that Africans pose to European colonizers misses the point when the reverse is in reality more pertinent.
The film’s approach to musical representation is much more traditional than might be expected. All representation of people is achieved diegetically: musical characterization is never explicitly a feature of the extra-diegetic underscore. Diegetic characterization as a means of signifying the Other is applicable here to an extent; but some diegetic musical scenes explicitly aim to draw viewer and performer together, as in the funeral rite the warriors provide for their dead comrade, singing a surprisingly blues-inflected number. Although the film’s diegetic and extra-diegetic musics superficially appear closely related, in reality, as often with film, they are from unrelated sources, produced by socially and culturally separate groups. Perhaps this avoidance of characterization through music was an explicit wish on Wilde’s part: as Prince’s audio commentary points out, the characters, especially The Man, are largely devoid of back-stories, and the film explicitly avoids the fleshing out of personality.
The Jackals (1967) Within the focus period of this study, there are few examples of the inclusion of African musicians in studio-based recording sessions for film, possibly as a direct consequence of apartheid, which discouraged the possibility of the inclusion of black musicians in white- owned studios. This is one potential example of apartheid’s direct influence on the structure of South African film scores. Even in The Jackals, which genuinely incorporates African music on the extra-diegetic soundtrack, the approach is contrary to standard music/film pairings. Typically, the film is shot and edited into a final cut; then music is 117 recorded to picture in postproduction. Under apartheid, use of African music in many cases entails placing pre-existing or pre-recorded music over the visuals. The result is the sensation that music and visuals do not particularly fit together. The Jackals avoids the standard techniques for convincing perceivers that the aural and visual elements are a coherent whole. Frequently, the music does not follow the action or even the tempo of the visuals. Culturally and stylistically, it is in direct opposition to the characters onscreen. Emotionally and expressively, it gives an impression of quasi-mystical introversiveness, in stark contrast to the protagonists’ entirely physical concerns of finding water in the desert and gold in the hills.52 In its impression of pasted-on afterthoughtness, the use of African music in this film has similarities to the use of orchestral library music in earlier South African films from the 1950s. However, this unusual approach was not due to lack of experience on the part of the film’s composers: Bob Adams and Joe Kentridge had already produced entirely competent scores for other films.53 Although unusual from the perspective of mainstream film scoring conventions (what Slobin 2008: 3) would refer to as the superculture of film music, the music of The Jackals is ground-breaking in certain respects.
The Jackals’ extra-diegetic underscore never uses its African music to denote the physical onscreen presence of Africans. The only such denotation is diegetic, occurring in the Shangaan song-and-dance sequence. More commonly, the film uses African music to score the landscapes where the action takes place, and to score the actions of the white characters. Except in The Naked Prey where African percussion accompanies The Man’s flight from his pursuers, African music accompanying anyone other than African characters, or used to score landscape, is unprecedented. Previous scoring of landscape tended towards Romantic orchestral pastoral tropes in the style of Beethoven’s “Pastoral” Symphony: trilling flutes, cor anglais solos and major 3rd modulations. Examples of this style are quite common in South African film, occuring in Simon Beyers, Inspan (1953 dir.
52 The use of music is disruptive enough to draw the attention of commenters on the film’s IMDb page. One warns, “[T]he film is accompanied by a weird, inappropriate and frankly awful score”. Another states “[t]here is a bizarre musical score that sounds WAY out of place for this type of movie”. A third claims, “[I]t is difficult to take seriously a jazzy xylophone-like score that adds nothing to the mood in a Western” (Reviews and Ratings for The Jackals 2015). 53 See Appendix A. 118
Bladon Peake), Daar Doer in die Stad (1954 dir. Jamie Uys), Untamed, Debbie (1965 dir. Elmo de Witt) and even Song of Africa.
The Shangaan are the tribal group figuring in The Jackals.54 The African music in the extra-diegetic underscore is played on a lamellophone; sonically and stylistically it is conceivably Shangaan in origin, compared with existing recordings of Shangaan lamellophone music (see for instance South African Music Archive Project (no date)). The credits provide no details regarding the music’s source or performer/s; the exact role of the credited composers is therefore unclear.
The extra-diegetic underscore uses (possibly) Shangaan lamellophone music extensively; but when the Shangaan actually appear, they are not extra-diegetically depicted by this music. Instead, a typical diegetic approach to African representation is followed, the Shangaan warriors singing and dancing, in a typical portrayal including communication exclusively en masse via song and dance, with the exception of their leader who alone can engage in dialogue with the white man. The introspective and individualistic lamellophone is abandoned for the communal dance, which offers a greater level of spectacle and enables a standardized treatment of the “native”. This is not surprising given the film’s close relationship to the Western genre. To its credit, however, The Jackals avoids the outright musical and social stereotypes of its 1940s predecessor.
The unusual approach to music in The Jackals allows for a reading, or intentional misreading, of the score as commentary on land ownership. The defining feature of the score is its resolute ignoring of the physical action and the psychology of the characters, scoring nothing but landscape. It thereby highlights the disjuncture between character and location. The music scores the landscape; the characters are completely mismatched to the landscape-obsessed music; therefore, the characters do not belong to the landscape. Regardless of how toughened to their environment the gang are, they remain outsiders,
54 There does not appear to be any particular motivation behind this choice; indeed, it seems at odds with the geography of the film, which takes place in and around a large desert, the likes of which does not exist in South Africa’s extreme north-east where, historically, the Shangaan were principally located. The Jackals is a scene-for-scene remake of the Hollywood Western Yellow Sky (1948 dir. William A. Wellman), the Shangaan standing in for the Apaches of the original. 119 imposing themselves on the land rather than symbiotically connected to it: they are interested only in exploiting its mineral wealth. They gratuitously destroy creatures integral to it, such as the lizard in the desert—precisely because it can survive in the harsh environment when they cannot. It is thus possible to read the extraordinary mismatch between action and music as an attempt to foreground the out-of-placeness of white colonists and their concerns in Africa: it is not the music that does not fit, but the characters.
In similar vein, the music’s lack of explicit signification, resulting in an ethereal, mystical quality, can be read as a signifier of loss; there is a ghostly quality to this music emanating from a people never seen. The implication is that the original inhabitants have been removed from the land to which they belong, replaced by people who do not understand or appreciate it as a space for existence beyond its capacity to provide mineral wealth. The music thus acquires a new set of meanings beyond those perhaps intended by the original composer.55 This relationship between musical meaning, mineral wealth and African displacement comes up in a somewhat similar form in Kimberley Jim, where Zulu labourers sing as they dig in the diamond fields: the song, stylistically if not specifically, harks back to a period before migrant industrial labour became a requirement for survival. The musical meaning of the song, or of the style, has shifted: what would originally have taken place in the context of everyday life in Zulu society, accompanying the actions of this life style, now becomes scant solace for those performing the music as they dig up the land that once represented their own livelihood.
Trends in the use of African music in the 1950s and 1960s While the 1950s experienced a lull in the use of rural African music in film, due to a shift in focus from historical frontier narratives to contemporary urban narratives, films of the 1960s returned to this phenomenon, now foregrounding rural African music as a central aspect of the score. The music’s integration into the films’ action suggests a more subtle reconsideration of the representative potential of music, but also a wider shift in the conceptualization of representation of black South Africans on film. There is still a vestige of the traditional approach to representation, maintained by Untamed and Zulu, both of
55 That is, the uncredited composer/s of the African material, and possibly also Adams and Kentridge. 120 which opt for the “singing Zulu masses” approach. However, the singing in Zulu is perhaps one of the most appealing and atmospheric elements of the film. The filmmakers foreground it as an actively engaging expressive element, unlike in 1930s and 1940s films, where rural African music is treated as a demonstration of savagery or inferiority, a means to induce fear in protagonists and thus in the audience, or simply as a way of adding a touch of exotic otherness. Dingaka and The Naked Prey engage with black South Africans on a much more personal level; music plays an important role in establishing this more intimate representation, even if stereotype is sometimes not far away. The Jackals is particularly unusual in abstracting African music from African peoples. All these films have a common desire to harness African music as an important expressive element in its own right. In terms of representation, this use can be nuanced, as in The Naked Prey, but can also still invoke a certain level of stereotyping, as in Dingaka, or can attempt to evade the relationship between physical presence and musical representation entirely, as in The Jackals, resulting in a strange, even eerie, music-visual mismatch.
Diegetic versus extra-diegetic music use is representationally fundamental; rural African music incorporated extra-diegetically signifies filmmakers’ willingness to incorporate African forms of expression into their own product’s aesthetic, as opposed to a preference for diegetic distancing, objectifying the music as that of the Other rather than including it in the film’s expressive palette. Only in the later 1960s is rural African music used extra- diegetically for any length of time.
While the general trend in the use of rural African film music over 30 years from Rhodes of Africa to The Jackals is towards a more informed and sensitive use, some perspective is necessary concerning numbers. The evidence regarding use of music may lead to the impression of a gradual increase in liberalism and understanding. This may be true within certain circles: it is difficult to imagine 1960s approaches ever being possible in the 1930s, for instance. But in terms of numbers, the 1960s films discussed here represent only a portion of the total industry; most films from this period avoid issues of race, preferring to ignore the country’s black population entirely, engaging in self-censorship encouraged by legislation such as the Publications and Entertainments Act of 1963 (Tomaselli 1989: 14). 121
Chapter 4 Urban African Music in South African Film
The urban environment The earliest films concerned with the urban African experience are African Jim, Zonk!, The Magic Garden, Cry, the Beloved Country and Song of Africa. These films have received the most attention in South African film studies, particularly African Jim, Zonk! and Song of Africa.1 They are among the few films where the music has received scholarly attention, partly because of their interest to film studies scholars and to musicologists, for whom they offer a rare visual insight into historical African popular music. Extensive focus on these films is thus not a priority, given that musical practice in the majority of South African films remains unexplored. I therefore preclude discussion of Zonk!, Song of Africa and The Magic Garden. Cry, the Beloved Country‘s music has never been addressed at any length, but its soundtrack tends to avoid urban African music,2 despite the film’s urban African focus, and is thus outside this chapter’s scope. I limit discussion of African Jim to its relationship to African American cinema and the importation of the latter’s representational model to a South African context. Music in Come Back, Africa has previously been limited to passing mention. This chapter addresses this omission. Finally, I look at music in Dilemma, a film that South African film studies have largely overlooked.
Aside from the films mentioned above, isolated instances of African urban music occur in other films from the period under review, including Dingaka, Code 7, Victim 5 [aka Table Bay, 1964 dir. Robert Lynn], Katrina (1969 dir. Jans Rautenbach) and Geheim van Nantes (1969 dir. Dirk de Villiers). These scenes occupy relatively minor roles within their filmic contexts, however. The latter three offer examples of music from the coloured community
1 For a discussion of sources that have dealt with these films, see Chapter 1. 2 A rare example is Solomon Linda’s “Mbube”, heard from 0:18:03 to 0:18:48, during the sequence in which the Reverend Khumalo is tricked out of his money after arriving in Johannesburg. 122 in the Cape: shots of the Cape Town Minstrel Carnival3 open Code 7, Victim 5; a coloured village choir sings in Katrina; and a goema4 song in Geheim van Nantes accompanies shots of coloured wine-farm workers receiving their tot system5 payment.6
Filmic portrayals of Africans during this period are inseparable from music. All the films listed at the beginning of this chapter explicitly foreground music and musicians (except Cry, the Beloved Country). This raises an interesting point about musical representation in these films: they nearly always represent black South Africans through diegetic musical performance. The two most prevalent tropes of these films are the arrival of the rural migrant in the city, and the African jazz band or singer. In some cases, as in African Jim and Song of Africa, the rural migrant is the jazz musician.
This prevalence of music and musicians has occurred in other times and places. Bollywood continues to base its entire industry around the musical. Early sound film in Hollywood disproportionately foregrounded musical performance and, to sustain this, demonstrated a preference for plots centered on musicians’ working lives. Reddick (1944: 369) lists 19 stereotypes of African Americans on film. Number 13 is “the natural-born musician”, and number 14 “the perfect entertainer”. The trend towards musical representation of black South Africans are possibly related to these Hollywood stereotypes. As Ansell (2005: 94- 95) points out, the two outlets through which black South Africans could escape their economic circumstances were sport, especially boxing, and music.7 These elements thus took on a disproportionate societal role through lack of access to other professions. This perhaps accounts for the popularity of music as a central filmic theme, regarding its apparent prevalence in contemporaneous black culture and its aspirational qualities, inspiring its audience to dream of possibilities.
3 Previously known as the “Coon Carnival”, this is an annual street parade in which members of the coloured community dress up in colourful clothes and play music while parading around the central Cape Town area (see CapeTownMagazine.com 2016). 4 Goema is a genre of music unique to the Cape, closely associated with the Minstrel Carnival. 5 Also known as the “dop” [Afrikaans for “drink”] system, the tot system involved paying farm labourers in Cape vineyards with alcohol, a practice now banned (see Larkin 2015). 6 I discuss Geheim van Nantes further in Chapter 5. 7 It is therefore probably not coincidental that the first all-African stage musical, King Kong (1959), foregrounds both these elements. 123
Chronologically, the films in this chapter fit between the two halves of Chapter 3, after Simon Beyers and before Dingaka. During this period, urban-focussed narratives displaced rural/historical/adventure narratives. This shift occurred in white, predominantly Afrikaans films of this period, which chose to focus on modern family themes and suburbia, and in the burgeoning black cinema, which recognized the existence of urban Africans. Thematically, this chapter extends the themes of Chapter 3, addressing film- musical representation of black South Africans in an urban context.
African Jim (1949) Certain authors8 have noted in passing the influence of the Hollywood all-African American productions Cabin in the Sky and Stormy Weather on South Africa’s first all- black film African Jim (1949 dir. Donald Swanson9). I argue that the influence went considerably beyond mere concept, however, especially regarding Stormy Weather. A comparison of the two films illuminates African Jim‘s function and meaning.
Stormy Weather’s narrative follows the fate of its male protagonist, Bill Robinson, as he rises from penniless homecoming 1st World War soldier to entertainment star. Arriving in New York after the war, he meets Selena Rogers, a famous singer, and sister to a fallen comrade. Some time later, working as a waiter, he encounters Selena again who convinces her own production’s lead, Chick Bailey, to give him a role in their show, launching Bill’s career. Bill and Selena become a famous double-act, and settle down together.
In African Jim, Jim arrives in Johannesburg from an unspecified rurality—probably Natal. He meets Dolly, a well-known singer. While working as a waiter at the Ngoma Club10 where Dolly sings, he impresses Dolly and the bandleader with his singing talent, and they
8 See for instance Fleming (2012: 196) and Davis (1996a: 26). 9 For further discussion of Swanson’s oeuvre, including the recently re-discovered Chisoko the African (1949), see Maingard (2013). 10 “Ngoma” means “drum” in various languages. In the Zulu context, it refers to a type of song and dance (Meintjies 2004: 173-4). Coplan (2008: 440) translates the Zulu word “ingoma” as “dance, song”, and defines it as “[i]n urban areas, a form of dance and song in traditional idiom developed by Zulu male migrant workers in the mines, factories, and domestic service”. As a platform for the singing debut of male migrant worker Jim, a “singer of African tribal songs” as the credits describe him, the Ngoma Club is perfectly named. 124 give him a chance to perform in their show.11 A record executive sees him singing, launching Jim’s career. Jim and Dolly record together, and while no romantic relationship is explicitly referred to, it is implied by the lyrics of their recording studio duet and their shared lingering looks.
African Jim‘s narrative framework is in essentials identical to Stormy Weather’s. The latter is considerably more complex, incorporating a flashback narrative framing device and multiple setpieces, and covers the protagonist’s life more extensively: African Jim is equivalent to about the first half of Stormy Weather, up until Bill’s big break. The differences in scale and production values do not disrupt the underlying similarities, however. The format is also similar: both are variety shows incorporating a full program of diverse acts, though Stormy Weather‘s changing locations and deeper narrative integration of musical numbers make this less explicit. The most overt link is the song “I Lost My Sugar in Salt Lake City”. This song was written for Stormy Weather, performed in the film by Mae E. Johnson.12 In African Jim, Dolly performs “I Came to Joburg, the Golden City”, to the same melody.13
African Jim thus capitalizes on the representative model of African Americans in Stormy Weather through transporting this model into a black South African context, feasible because of the pre-existing self-identification of black South African musicians with their African American counterparts.14 This model did not simply influence the level of the fictional world of the film: as Fleming (2012) documents, it significantly influenced the real-world representation of the film’s actors, giving rise for the first time to the category of black South African film/entertainment star.
11 The bandleader suggests, “On Friday night, he can work as a singing waiter”. Dolly comments, “What an idea!” [0:34:45]. This is perhaps an in-joke, a self-aware reference to the plot’s derivation from pre-existing Hollywood sources that used this device, such as Hollywood Hotel (1937. dir. Busby Berkeley) and Stormy Weather. 12 Not written for Cabin in the Sky and performed by Lena Horne, as both Davis (1996a: 25) and Fleming (2012: 203) state. 13 Regarding specific links between musical numbers, similarities also exist between Stormy Weather and Song of Africa: both contain supposed “African dance” sequences in which a dancer leaps from one massive drum to another, while an ensemble of drummers beats out the rhythm of the dance. The similarity is sufficiently strong to suggest direct influence. 14 See, for instance, Ballantine (1999). 125
Both films, then, use the trope of singing, or performance generally, to enable African or African American people to overcome the otherwise insurmountable obstacles placed on the path to success by their repressive societies.15 South African black audiences were familiar with Stormy Weather.16 Perhaps, then, African Jim‘s makers intended the use of its narrative template to be explicitly allusive, a familiar narrative structure demonstrating to audiences that local product could harness the tools and techniques used to construct Hollywood’s glamorous fantasy—the musicians in African Jim aim for a similar result, after all. The importation also encourages direct comparison between African American and black South African culture. While Hollywood remained an exploitative environment for African Americans,17 the difference between the output of an industry which promotes cultural production for the commercial gain of performer and promoter, and one which suppresses cultural production and undermines it politically and socially, is thrown into stark relief through the film’s narrative similarities. In this sense, African Jim functions politically, in spite of its determination not to do so. In a pre-Black Consciousness18 society, which achieved subservience through undermining of self-esteem, the film provides a model of representation on two levels. Firstly, it provides inspiration and hope to its target audience, demonstrating that local cultural production deserves a place in film. Secondly, it highlights, through stark juxtaposition, what could be achieved without state repression of cultural production, demonstrating the effects of cultural repression and
15 This trope is not unique to either of these films, however; an earlier version occurs in the UK production Song of Freedom (1936 dir. J. Elder Wills), as Paul Robeson’s dockworker character is overheard singing and elevated to star performer. The trope (or perhaps myth) of singing as a passage to stardom is now pervasive in popular culture, with shows like The X Factor and Pop Idols offering the prospect of instant fame to anyone who believes themselves able to sing. 16 See Davis (1996a: 30); Muller (2008: 179) states that “Cabin in the Sky… and Stormy Weather… were two of the most popular movies shown in South Africa in the mid-1940s”. 17 As Doughty (2009: 329) states, “[f]rom the birth of the Hollywood studios, African Americans have been consistently exploited by the industry, overlooked or had their cultural voice appropriated by others”. See also Maynard (1974), who analyses the history of Hollywood representation of black characters. 18 Black Consciousness was a movement during apartheid South Africa that aimed to encourage positive notions of black identity. In the words of Black Consciousness leader Steve Biko, “[i]t seeks to demonstrate the lie that black is an aberration from the "normal" which is white” (Biko 1971). 126 negation on black South Africans’ cultural potential. It juxtaposes what is and what could be.19
Musically, from the first note of the opening credits African Jim already breaks new ground: this is the first time African music has appeared extra-diegetically in a South African film.20 The film does not maintain the use of extra-diegetic African music beyond the credits sequence, however; scenes incorporating extra-diegetic music rely on library music in an English light orchestral style, a staple of South African films of the period. Perhaps the filmmakers intended this approach to legitimize the film as a “real” feature film with an orchestral underscore, in the style of Hollywood and European productions; the effect is to detract from the product’s uniqueness, appearing aspirational rather than ground-breaking. The first extra-diegetic African music soundtrack appears ten years later, in Come Back, Africa.
Come Back, Africa (1959) As with earlier films dealing with the lives and cultural activities of black South Africans, an extensive body of literature addresses Come Back, Africa.21 Unlike earlier films, however, the soundtrack has received minimal attention, barring occasional remarks by Maingard (2007: 113 and 117) and Balseiro (2003: 89 and 93). While writers have recognized purely visual metaphors, such as the use of iron girders to imply crucifixion, sonic-visual metaphors have been overlooked or treated literally; metaphor, however, is a
19 Duarte (2011) has identified this type of “what is and what could be” juxtaposition as the underlying ingredient to great speeches, from Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg address to Martin Luther King’s “I have a dream” to Steve Jobs’s iPhone release speech. Whether the juxtaposition was intentional or not on the part of the filmmakers, the effectiveness of the technique makes the point firmly. 20 There are five films since the start of the sound era and prior to African Jim whose musical content I am not fully aware of; yet I am confident, based on the period, genre and conceptual framework of these films, that this statement will stand. The films are ‘n Dogter van die Veld, Lig van ‘n Eeu (1942 dir. A.A. Pienaar), Strange Princess (1942), Die Wildsboudjie (1946 dir. Arthur Bennett and Louis Knobel) and Die Pantoffelregering (1947 dir. Roland Brantford and Anton Ackerman). 21 Modisane (2013a), Maingard (2007), Balseiro (2003) and Davis (1996a) provide substantial analyses of the film, while Davis (2004) presents director Lionel Rogosin’s own account of the film’s production. Masilela (1991) sees the film as central to the creation of an “authentic national cinema”. The Sophiatown intellectuals who acted in and co-wrote the film have also commented on it, in Nkosi (1960) and Modisane (1963). 127 common strategy of the film’s soundtrack. Following the opening credits, for instance, the sound of frantic knocking accompanies a shot of a building façade with closed double doors, as if someone is desperate to enter. Yet no one is outside the door. The implication is that somebody is inside the building, banging to be released. Left silent, this would be no more than an establishing shot of a slightly dilapidated building. The addition of the knocking with no visible agent creates an eerie, sinister scene. The metaphor is easily applicable to the film’s protagonists, trapped in a mad system, desperate to escape to normality.22
While the film foregrounds the issue of migrant labour, no study has remarked on the dialectic of rural versus urban music within the film. How does the combination of rural and urban African musics in the urban environment contribute to the representation of Africans in that environment? I address this question in the course of the analysis. The resulting reading resonates with Fisher’s comments regarding the scoring of African cinema more generally: in contrast to mainstream film music, which functions
simply as a means of underscoring narrative action and reifying meaning, aiming to draw the viewer into a passive engagement with the narrative… African films are perhaps characterized by more autonomous uses of music, invoking narrative and thematic associations that demand “active” viewer engagement. (2015: 41)
Many online sources, including IMDb, and multiple reviews of the film,23 credit the music to Chatur Lal, a prominent Indian tabla player who died in 1965 aged 40. The distribution company’s publicity posters for the film’s 2012 re-release state “Featuring the music of Chatur Lall [sic]” (Milestone Films 2012). The film’s opening credits (there are no final credits) do not mention Chatur Lal or any other composer, however; the only music credit is “Music Editor: Lucy Brown”. There is no credit for the composers of Miriam Makeba‘s two shebeen scene songs; these are “Lakutshon’ ilanga” by Mackay Davashe and “Into
22 Guldimann (2003: 130) offers an alternative reading of the knocking, considering it suggestive of “the intrusion of police into someone’s home”, prefiguring Zachariah’s arrest in the raid on his wife Vinah’s domestic quarters. This accounts for the sonic element, but the visual element of the empty street with the dilapidated building and closed doors still requires further explanation. 23 See for instance Long (2014), Kennedy (2012) and Pinkerton (2012). 128
Yam” by Dorothy Masuka. Neither are there performer or composer credits for the film’s use of rural music recordings. Stylistically, the involvement of Chatur Lal is difficult to ascertain: the score is unremittingly African, with no trace of the style one might expect from an Indian classical tabla player.24
There are four different sources of music in this film: extra-diegetic rural music; extra- diegetic film composition; diegetic urban music; and sound as metaphor. In my analysis below, I use these sources as categories for further discussion of Come Back, Africa’s music.
Extra-diegetic rural music When rural African music is heard extra-diegetically in the film, this would appear to come from pre-existing library sources. The ability to aurally identify pre-recorded library music, as opposed to music recorded specifically for the film, depends on the effectiveness of the chosen music and its integration with the physical and expressive qualities of the film’s visual and spoken elements. It can also depend on qualities inherent in the actual recording, such as background noises and ambience. All this presupposes that the credits supply no or minimal musical information, as with Come Back, Africa. The lack of musical information is itself frequently a signifier of library music. The inclusion of extra-diegetic rural African music is probably where the credited music editor, Lucy Brown, was involved: her task would most likely have been to collect relevant examples and fit them to the film.25 There are, in total, four such cues in the entire film: two use lamellophone with vibrators, accompanied by singing, and two use a xylophone-like instrument.
24 I contacted the Pandit Chatur Lal Memorial Society (2015) for clarity on his involvement. They confirmed his association with Lionel Rogosin and Come Back, Africa, but were not able to provide details. Some online retailers, specifically Amazon, offer an album by Lal entitled “Drums of North & South Africa” (Lal et al.: no date), which would suggest the possibility of involvement in a project like Come Back, Africa. However, on purchasing and receiving this rare vinyl album, it transpired the retailer had provided the title incorrectly. The album’s title is “Drums of North & South India”. The album therefore provides no precedent for Lal’s involvement in an African musical context. I have not found any definitive documentary evidence supporting Chatur Lal’s involvement in Come Back, Africa. 25 Regrettably, Rogosin’s diarized account of filming Come Back, Africa, presented in Davis (2004), ends with the shooting of the final scene. The post-production process, including music preparation, is not covered. Cameraman Emil Knebel provides the only soundtrack-specific information in his short appendix to the book, where he writes that 129
The lamellophone is first heard over the opening credits, prior to Zachariah arriving in Johannesburg, and later over inserts of a power station and the streets of Johannesburg, following Zachariah’s wife Vinah arriving in the city [0:34:15]. The opening credits cue, then, prefigures Zachariah’s arrival from the rural areas, while the later cue is associated with Vinah’s arrival. In both cases, neither their rural home nor their journey is depicted; the rural lamellophone cue could therefore be interpreted as shorthand for their rural provenance, a sound metaphor for their rurality.26 The closest stylistic match I have found to these cues is the music of the Mbukushu people, from the Namibian Caprivi Strip area. The thishanji is the Mbukushu lamellophone.27 The playing style relies on short, rhythmic ostinato figures, accompanied by similarly short melodic phrases played and simultaneously sung; this is in contrast to the longer harmony-centred phrases of the Shona mbira style, for instance. The choice could seem arbitrary in relation to Zachariah and
[a] few weeks after my departure from Johannesburg… I went to New York to assist in completing the film. At that time Carl [Lerner, editor], Hugh [A. Robertson, assistant editor] and Lucy [Brown, music editor] were working on the sound-track. (Davis 2004: 142).
After describing the difficulties choosing and editing a suitable ending for the film, he describes the result, including the addition of the soundtrack: “[t]he ending was simple, emotionally moving; it summed up the entire film…. The sound-track was added later on” (2004: 142). Based on Knebel’s description, Rogosin himself was apparently not intimately involved in the musical decision-making process. 26 Fisher (2015: 44) describes a sequence from Life is Beautiful (1987 dir. Benoît Lamy and Mweze Ngangura), set in Zaire, that likewise uses music to represent a migrant’s passage from rural to urban life:
Kourou …, an out of work musician from the suburbs, heads into Kinshasa to realize his dreams. This music continues to function in relation to the tradition vs modernity opposition. First we see and hear a traditional mbira … being played, its sound epitomizing indigenous African music. We then see traditionao communcal call-and-response singing before contemporary rumba music, which draws heavily from the music of the African diaspora, is heard coming from the radio of a passing truck. Thus the film’s opening moments lead us from the simplicity of “tradition” to the complex hybridity of modernity, articulated through the medium of music.
27 See the recordings by Dave Dargie of the Mbukushu thishanji: Andara Music Workshop Participant (1988) and Maghundu (1988). 130
Vinah’s Zulu origins, especially given the lack of a lamellophone tradition in that culture, although the film makes no claim to be addressing only Zulu issues.
Stark contrast appears to motivate these cues’ choice and placement. The opening credits sequence contrasts the urban desolation of a semi-demolished Sophiatown28 house29 with music of a very traditional sort. The contrast creates a direct association between the atmospheric, culturally rich performance and the cultural bankruptcy of the system responsible for destroying homes and lives. It therefore creates a dialectic between two states of Africanness—the precolonial and the colonial, their respective representations through music and image played off against one another.30 This tension between rural and urban generates the sequence’s meaning. It also serves to demonstrate Fisher’s point, quoted above, that “African films are perhaps characterized by more autonomous uses of music, invoking narrative and thematic associations that demand ‘active’ viewer engagement” (2015: 41).
Use of urban popular music would have generated a quite different meaning; exactly what meaning can be observed directly, using the simple solution of turning down the video player’s volume and running the credits sequence while simultaneously running, for instance, Miriam Makeba’s performance of “Into Yam” from the film, available on YouTube (see “Into Yam” (2012)). I found this combination considerably more effective: a song originating from a particular urban environment, paired with an image of that environment destroyed, reinterprets the song’s jolliness as poignant, nostalgic melancholy. The connection between song and environment is more direct; the lamellophone song is more abstract in relation to the visuals, and thus lacks expressive immediacy.
28 Sophiatown was a suburb of Johannesburg. It was one of the few areas in the country in which blacks were still permitted to own land, and also one of the few mixed-race areas. From the mid 1950s, the suburb was gradually demolished and its inhabitants moved to Meadowlands, a far-flung area consisting of houses without amenities such as water, toilets and electricity (see South African History Online 2016). 29 This is the very house used in the film as the home of Zachariah and Vinah; the ongoing destruction of Sophiatown is therefore made palpable, the transition from home to rubble occurring as the filming progressed. 30 I discussed this strategy of contrasting urban sterility and oppression against rural creativity in Chapter 3 in relation to the later Dingaka, which also makes the point with lamellophone, played by a prisoner in an overcrowded holding cell. 131
The second lamellophone cue is similar in purpose to the first. Rogosin’s impression of Johannesburg was that “the whole aspect of the city was one to inspire dread and gloom” (Davis 2004: 20). He favours shots of the city and industry seemingly in the early morning, when the streets are deserted, to capture this atmosphere of what he called “a ghost city” (2004: 22). The lamellophone cue offsets this sterile environment. This cue also includes the sounds of children vocalizing and dancing,31 further contrasting with the bleak, impersonal cityscapes.
These cues retain the film’s focus on the centrality of the African perspective, which Rogosin went to some lengths to understand. Bloke Modisane writes, “[b]y the time he was ready to shoot his film we had conditioned him to see black, to feel black and to react black” (Davis 2004: 133). Balseiro’s theme of “black claims on white cities” (2003) is appropriate here: the film reinterprets the city musically through its black residents’ perceptions. It does not attempt to musically separate “white” spaces, namely the city and industrial environment, from “black” spaces, in this case Sophiatown. African music occurs throughout, affirming that this film is about African perceptions of the urban space. As with The Jackals, whites, although they have established themselves with brick and mortar, and with economic, political and military force, remain outsiders to the land and its people. By engaging in domination and exclusivity, they ensure their alienness in relation to the occupied space. The extra-diegetic music refuses to accept them. Music typically supports visuals, and appears out of place if this contract is not adhered to. In this case, the visuals are out of place, not the music.
Extra-diegetic film composition As noted above, many sources cite Chatur Lal’s musical involvement with Come Back, Africa, although no composer credit exists.32 This category is the most plausible area for his involvement. The specification “film composition” used in the heading of this section refers to music written specifically for the film, unlike the other categories addressing sources not originally associated with the film. Of the two recurring cues in this category,
31 I infer the dancing from the sound of foot stamping and the breathlessness of the children’s voices. 32 He is typically not outrightly cited as the composer, however; Davis (2004: 5), for example, states “Featuring the music of Chatur Lal”. 132 however, one seems to originate from field, rather than studio, recordings: barely audible but present in the background are the sound of voices [0:11:53], and possibly a baby crying followed by coughing [0:20:09].
There are only two cues in this category, though each is repeated a number of times, always in relation to the same type of image. Each cue includes only one timbre, consisting of a short rhythmic figure effectively looped for the cue’s duration. The first of these is a musical bow: judging from the variable harmonic content, probably a gourd-resonated bow, and probably unbraced, since only one fundamental is used.33 The second consists of drumming, characterized predominantly by a very low, incessant bass drum, with three mid- to high-pitched drums above it. Both cues fade in and out at the beginnings and endings of their scenes—a sure sign that the cues were not specifically scored to picture, but have been taken from pre-existing sources or scored using an atmospheric approach without direct reference to the visual element. Given the apparent involvement of a composer, the latter would be the case.
The bow is played in a particularly harsh, frenetic manner, out of character with such instruments’ typical idiomatic use of accompanying song. Typically, the tempo is slower and the expressive quality less urgent. The approach to the bow is comparable to extra- diegetic African music use in The Naked Prey, which includes African instruments used outside the ambit of their normal performance practice to convey a particular meaning associated with the visual element. This seems an inevitable, and potentially positive, strategy: as with Western concert music, some adaptation is necessary to function effectively in the film environment. The wholesale application of pre-existing classical works can be highly effective, but only under select circumstances, for instance as a component of montage sequences driven by a particular expressive state or atmospheric quality. Pre-existing performances of African music can also function well in this manner. But scoring a particular scene according to standard mainstream conventions34 tends to require (as Andrew Tracey experienced and documented regarding The Naked Prey) the
33 Potential candidates could be the Xhosa uhadi or the Zulu ugubhu. 34 As discussed in Chapter 1; see particularly Figure 5. Conventions include a strong physical link between music and onscreen action, close attention to the psychological states of characters, atmospheric scoring of scenarios, and technical aspects such as smoothing over of visual hard cuts. 133 use of instruments and musical language outside the context of their standard idiomatic approach.
The bow cue, heard on four separate occasions, primarily accompanies shots of the city during scene transitions, characterizing Johannesburg according to Rogosin’s view of it as a foreboding place, its architecture, Rogosin postulates, a physical embodiment of the ills of apartheid. Struck with a rhythmic, repetitive urgency, the sound of the bow becomes mechanistic, imitating the sound of some chugging machine. Its use thereby becomes metaphorical: it is a representation of rural Africa displaced to the city, just as rural Africans themselves are displaced. It mutates from its rural mode of representation to a mechanistic/industrial mode of representation, just as individual Africans themselves are forced into the role of virtual automatons, cogs in the wheels of industry. Rogosin uses this metaphor himself in relation to the training programme for new miners he witnessed, which appears briefly in the film: “[t]he school is very modern, but diabolical. It is a machine: precise in its organisation and inhuman in its impersonality” (Davis 2004: 26).
The bow music, at least in the opening establishing shots of Zachariah and his fellow workers navigating Johannesburg’s streets to the mines, accompanies scenes of both blacks and whites going about their business in the city. As in The Jackals, this could be an attempt to reclaim the (city) space through music, scoring black culture and thus the black people on screen, ignoring the whites much in the style Sartre describes in his introduction to Fanon’s The wretched of the Earth (2001: 11-12): they have become an irrelevance, part only of the problem, not the solution. The film exposes the underground of South African society, both literally and figuratively, capturing the horrors of mine work supporting the white society above. It offers a proto-postcolonial reading, deconstructing white South Africa’s image of modern progress and civilization. It is eerily reminiscent of Metropolis (1927 dir Fritz Lang), which depicts an elite, apparently utopian society in a futuristic cityscape. The wealthy, however, are maintained by the ceaseless labours of the majority deep underground, who, like South African industrial workers, have become virtual pieces of machinery.
The focus on Johannesburg streets, and the musical representations of the characters who move through it, invites comparison with a similar scene from a very different film: Al 134
Debbo’s comedy Tom, Dirk en Herrie (1962) [approximately 0:25:00]. Both scenes follow their respective protagonists walking through downtown Johannesburg, and are about wealth: Zachariah is in the city to try to make money; Tom is attempting to lose money, giving wads of it away wherever possible, in order to be eligible for a large inheritance. The black and white relationships to wealth in the same time and space are telling, as is the fact that the white view of the city entirely expunges the black presence from the frame and from consciousness, while from the black view the white presence is all-encompassing. Equally intriguing is the music accompanying these scenes: a frenetic musical bow accompanies Zachariah’s scene; a laid-back jazz track accompanies Tom’s. For Tom, the city is a backdrop for his smooth cosmopolitanism. Ironically, given the film’s context of Verwoerd’s South Africa,35 an era of increasing international isolation and racial segregation, the air of cosmopolitanism relies on a jazz soundtrack.36 To create this cosmopolitan character, it is necessary to culturally appropriate music from international sources stylistically developed and probably played by black musicians. The music, then, fosters the illusion of the cosmopolitanism of the country’s moneyed elite, at a time of increasing introversion and provinciality. While for Tom, the city is a space for a leisurely, carefree stroll, for Zachariah, the same city is a hostile, alien space, the musical cue encouraging a sense of frantic bustling. In these two scenes, then, the city space itself is musically represented through the characters’ perceptions of it, the music a psychological representation of the characters’ interpretations of the city space. Zachariah’s perceptions of the city qualify Tom’s perceptions, undermining the veneer of cosmopolitanism.
The second extra-diegetic cue potentially written specifically for the film is the drumming cue. This cue occurs eight times, and each time, barring the last, accompanies shots of commuters walking en masse through the streets. The drumming’s cultural provenance is
35 Hendrik Verwoerd was Prime Minister of South Africa from 1958-1966. He is colloquially known as “the architect of apartheid” due to his role in establishing key apartheid legislation, such as the establishment of separate black homelands. During Verwoerd’s term, the notorious 1960 Sharpeville Massacre occurred, in which police shot and killed 69 people gathered to protest the pass laws. 36 I have been unsuccessful in determining the composer or performers of the piece in question, though stylistically it appears to be American rather than South African. This same piece is also used in Die Tweede Slaapkamer (1962 dir. Gordon Vorster), functioning as a motif for the character Emcee, although the two films were made by different studios. 135 unclear; the drums themselves sound African in timbre, while the style of playing sounds Indian, with its shifting patterns of polyrhythms. Beneath the drums is a faint, constant murmur of voices, as of many different conversations occurring simultaneously in a crowded space. This appears to be mixed in from the location recording of the commuters; but even in the final cue, discussed below, where commuters do not appear, the murmur of conversation is audible, suggesting it is an inseparable part of the drum cue, recorded simultaneously to the drums themselves.
The final occurrence of the drums is in the final scene, accompanying Zacharia’s intense despair at his wife’s death, interspersed with shots of all the dehumanizing, futile jobs he has engaged in. Recontextualized in this manner, the drums become a sonic embodiment of the hellish system, which grinds on relentlessly, completely indifferent to the lives it destroys. As with the bow cue, the steady, relentless drums emphasize the inhuman, machine-like quality of life forced onto Africans in the urban environment.
Diegetic urban music The diegetic inclusion of urban music occurs primarily as live, apparently spontaneous recordings of black musicians on the streets of central Johannesburg and Sophiatown, as well as the more formal Miriam Makeba performances in the shebeen and on the radio Zachariah listens to while working. The street music, notable in its sheer variety of acts and musical styles, largely functions in a documentary rather than narrative manner. It partially gives truth to Rogosin’s ironic official account of his activities, which as Bloke Modisane describes it, was to make an “African musical… presenting the music of Africa to the world, to show that Africans were basically a happy people” (Davis 2004: 133). Rogosin’s aim was perhaps similar to urban black musicians’ of a slightly earlier period, who believed that their music itself would act as an argument in their favour, and could “demonstrate to whites that black people were worthy of better social, political and economic treatment—in short, it should seek to effect a moral persuasion” (Ballantine 2012: 55). Such an argument overlooks that apartheid was as much an economic system, motivated by grand-scale nepotism, as a social, racist system.37
37 See Tomaselli (1989) for a fuller discussion of this interpretation, and the relationship between film production and the economics of apartheid. 136
The display of humanity through musical production may have been convincing to some European and American audiences; but in South Africa, the white viewpoint was to take performance by black musicians as evidence of blacks’ cheery contentment with apartheid,38 as Rogosin capitalized on in his cover story. Musical production is interpreted as demonstrating precisely a lack of normal human emotion, justifying racial superiority, an attitude portrayed in the above-mentioned39 1959 Sunday Times review of Come Back, Africa (quoted in Davis (1996a: 58)): “[t]here are only stark misery, domineering policemen and debauched, pathetic shebeen scenes, with nothing of the laughter and smiles of street corner kwela players”.40 Zachariah listening to music on the radio41 while working as a house servant functions as a microcosm of one of the roles of music in a repressive society, namely to mentally escape the drudgery and hardship—in other words, to create some joy, not to engage in because one already feels joyful. Music used in this manner has a similar but more constructive function to the use of alcohol, which Zachariah also indulges in during this scene.42
Rogosin’s footage of street performers functions as social commentary on an additional level: the camera focusses on the performers but also on the audience, South Africans of all backgrounds standing side-by-side watching the performance. In the spirit of the quasi- documentary style, Rogosin does not appear to take a position on this localized failure of petty apartheid; but cliché though it may be, music does indeed seem to be actively demonstrating its power to unite, which is perhaps the point of the camera pans through the audience. Within the confines of the apartheid system, music is one of the only strategies available for blacks to assert themselves on the urban space—a space they are otherwise simply expected to work in and then leave. By providing this musical service,
38 See in this regard the discussion in Chapter 3 of slave music in Building a Nation. 39 See footnote 26 of Chapter 3. 40 This is a strange observation in itself, since the film in fact portrays street-corner kwela players quite extensively; and the shebeen scenes represent one of the film’s strongest arguments against apartheid. 41 The song is “Tula Ndivile”, by the Manhattan Brothers with Miriam Makeba. 42 Guldimann (2003: 137) notes an interesting parallel with African Jim here: Jim also loses his job as a domestic servant through listening to the radio instead of engaging in his cleaning work. While Jim gets lost in memories of his rural home, Zachariah enjoys the sounds of urban popular music. There is a certain irony here, since Jim successfully integrates himself into the urban environment through popular music, while Zachariah’s urban sojourn ends in disaster. 137 however, they seem to gain some acceptance in the eyes of their white audience. This acceptance is mediated by the fact that from the musicians’ perspective, despite the varied talent on offer, the streets are the only outlet for performance.
Zachariah’s interaction as domestic servant with his employers the Myrtles highlights an important musical strategy of the film: it reverses the roles typically assigned in South African film. Music never accompanies the whites, while it does accompany blacks. 43 Mr and Mrs Myrtle are left completely dry, as are all the other baases [masters] that appear throughout the film. This is a common approach for scoring minor antagonists, essentially negative characters whose petty vindictiveness does not qualify for the grandeur of a villainous theme. A good contemporary example is John Williams’ approach to Harry Potter’s relatives, the Dursleys, in Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (2001 dir. Chris Columbus). Unmagical, and jealous and suspicious of Harry’s powers, they are never awarded the honour of having their petty emotions scored; this is in contrast to Harry and the magical world in general, who receive copious amounts of colourful music. Going beyond mere unpleasantness however, Voldemort, as Harry’s arch-nemesis, receives his own theme. It is interesting that a Voldemort figure is distinctly absent from Come Back, Africa: there is no ominous theme for an arch-nemesis, because the system is faceless. The only representatives of it are the white baases, whose mean-spiritedness does not deserve music; the occasional references to pass laws that prevent Zachariah from going about his business; the decay of Sophiatown and Alexandra; and the shebeen discussion of the country’s problems. The policemen who raid Vinah’s room are the closest thing to a face for the system. Apartheid is thus experienced as a second-hand phenomenon, pervasive but entirely nebulous. Musically, it is experienced as an absence, devoid of a central antagonist to villainize through music. In terms of Slobin’s (2008) concept of the superculture, discussed in Chapter 1 under “Mainstream film music studies”, this scoring approach could be read as a reversal of the standard supercultural scoring model, in particular the concept of “erasure”, in which ethnicities besides the white protagonists are deprived of accompanying music.
43 These role allocations are not unique to South African film: Kassabian (2001) notes the non- scoring of black characters in Lethal Weapon 2 and The Hunt for Red October, for instance. 138
The use of African music, particularly diegetically, has a rare fidelity to it: it does not attempt to manipulate the expressive purposes of the music to its own ends through re- writing or recontextualization, as happens in the 1960s films with African music. The price it pays for this is that the diegetic music scenes, with the possible exception of Makeba’s shebeen songs and “Tula Ndivile” on the radio, are not really integrated into any overarching storyline; but the quasi-documentary nature of the project makes such an integration neither particularly necessary nor desirable.
Sound as metaphor The “Extra-diegetic film composition” section above demonstrated how the recurring musical bow and drums cues functioned metaphorically as displaced, mechanized rurality. Aside from these musical cues, sound effects are also used metaphorically at various points during the film. However, as this chapter focusses on urban African music, a discussion of the musical meaning of urban sound effects would be out of place here. It is worth noting a few examples, however. I discussed the door-knocking metaphor above [0:02:13]. Other sound metaphors include the use of the siren piercing the silence directly following the opening credits [0:01:44], and the mine machinery [0:06:39]. The siren, ringing frantically over deserted scenes of Johannesburg, seems to cover the same terrain as the door-knocking metaphor—this is a place from which one must escape. Regarding the mine machinery, the initial distant, airy, whistling sound of the mine elevators, paired with the eerie scene of the miners lined up in the night, only their torches visible, and the otherwise silent close-ups of the faces of the miners, seems to intensify the anticipatory fear and trepidation of the new recruits. The hideous groaning of the machinery below the surface seems representative of the horrors of the system itself: oppressive, frightening, inhuman and pervasive, a real version of the machine-like musical bow and drum cues.
Dilemma (1962) Dilemma in film scholarship Dilemma to an extent belongs to the group of films produced in the early years of apartheid concerned with black perspectives on South Africa listed at the beginning of this chapter, from African Jim to Come Back, Africa. While these films, however, mostly address rural/urban migrancy, Dilemma deals entirely with the city space: the black South Africans 139 depicted are unequivocally urban. Yet it has received much less scholarly attention than any of these other films.44 This is probably for two reasons. Firstly, Come Back, Africa, produced three years earlier, arguably addresses their similar themes in a deeper and more personal manner; in this light, Dilemma seems a later, less penetrating version of Come Back, Africa. Secondly, and giving rise to the first, while the film is centrally concerned with black South African life under apartheid, and includes some discussion of the implications of apartheid legislature, it approaches this theme from an oblique perspective: the central character, Toby Hood, who actually faces the “dilemma” of the film’s title, is a white British immigrant. Toby’s viewpoint is the filter for all the problems encountered by the black characters and by the whites attempting to aid them. Toby’s “dilemma” is whether he should simply enjoy life with his wealthy upper class white friends in an entirely whitewashed and supposedly apolitical world; or whether he should engage with the cause of his black friends Steve Sithole and Sam Mofokenzazi, 45 and with Anna Louw, an activist lawyer. While Toby, then, can simply choose to walk away from the injustices he witnesses, Steve, Sam and Anna cannot.
Toby’s viewpoint thus has the advantage of exposing the attitudes of a wide cross-section of South African society; but the disadvantage that it does not fully engage in the issues faced by Steve and other black South Africans in the manner that Come Back, Africa does. The writing credits reflect this fact: Come Back, Africa is co-written by Lewis Nkosi and Bloke Modisane, together with Rogosin; Dilemma is written by Henning Carlsen, based on Nadine Gordimer’s novel A World of Strangers. Justifiably or no, Dilemma therefore has liberalist issues, resulting from white writers speaking on behalf of blacks, much as Alan
44 Many of the central sources of South African film studies make no mention of the film at all, including Botha (2012), Tomaselli (2006), Balseiro and Masilela (2003), Davis (1996a), Tomaselli (1988) and Le Roux and Fourie (1982). Maingard (2007) makes brief mention of it. This seems surprisingly neglectful treatment given that the film provides an almost unique view of African jazz in the early 1960s, with prominent acting performances by Zakes Mokae and Gideon Nxumalo, and sequences of musical performance by local South African musicians, including Nxumalo and Mackay Davashe. 45 Discussing Nadine Gordimer’s novel A World of Strangers, from which Dilemma is adapted, Gray (1988: 12) and Kruger (2013: 79) interpret Mofokenzazi as a fictional version of Todd Matshikiza, the composer of the 1959 South African jazz musical King Kong. Kruger suggests that Sithole is based on Can Themba; Themba appears as himself in the shebeen scene of Come Back, Africa. 140
Paton, for instance, does in Cry, the Beloved Country; Come Back, Africa, by contrast, overcomes this potentially patronizing approach and allows the black writers to speak for themselves.
Nxumalo, Roach and representation Although the script may not be written by black South Africans, the music is, at least in part; Gideon Nxumalo’s46 music credit is a rarity for a black South African in a South African film. American jazz drummer Max Roach is the second credited composer. Unlike Come Back, Africa, Dilemma actually credits at least its lead performers, noting Sophie Mgcina,47 Ben Masinga and Abbey Lincoln as singers, and Mackay Davashe and Max Roach as band-leaders. Nxumalo’s music occurs diegetically, played by himself and others. The scenes of a full jazz band with singers rehearsing are partitioned from the narrative itself: the only link is the occasional presence of Steve, Toby or Sam.
Max Roach, although credited, was not involved in the project. His music features extensively, but comes from his 1960 album We Insist! Max Roach’s Freedom Now Suite (See Roach 2014),48 and had no prior association with the film. The filmmakers probably used this album because of its specific South African connection, and its political stance against oppression of both African Americans and Africans. It includes “Tears for Johannesburg”, dedicated to the victims of the Sharpeville massacre. Given this link, and African American jazz’s influence on South African jazz musicians of the time, it is thematically appropriate, though fills space that ideally should hold South African music.
An advantage of its inclusion is the additional layer of meaning it provides for those familiar with Roach’s music, importing the civil rights narrative wholesale into the film in a way commissioned music could not, creating resonances between the liberation struggles of the two countries. Most extra-diegetic music accompanying the narrative of the film comes from this album. Such extensive foregrounding of pre-existing music is unusual, including even the opening and closing credits cues. As discussed above, the direct
46 The credits spell Nxumalo’s surname “Nxomalo”. 47 The end credits simply refer to her as “Sophy” [sic], with no surname provided. 48 This also accounts for the singing credit to Abbey Lincoln, who sang on this album. Coming from a pre-existing recording, her singing is always extra-diegetic, unlike Sophie Mgcina’s and Ben Masinga, whose singing is always diegetic. 141 importation of structure and music from the African American production Stormy Weather heavily influenced African Jim‘s narrative. Thirteen years later, importation of African American music has the same effect on Dilemma. Both films import African American identity wholesale to achieve their aims—African Jim to convey its liberal/paternalist message with a potentially radical undercurrent, Dilemma to convey its more insistent Civil Rights Movement-era call for the rectification of injustice. The anti-apartheid strategies followed by these two films therefore reflect the development of artistic production as a tool for human rights in African American culture.
The film uses three tracks from We Insist!: “Triptych: Prayer/Protest/Peace”, “All Africa” and “Tears for Johannesburg”. The first of these is structurally important: the film opens with the “Prayer” section over scenes of Johannesburg streets, in shots almost interchangeable with Come Back, Africa. Some cutting and pasting occurs: “Peace” is supposed to follow “Protest”, and “is the feeling of relaxed exhaustion after you’ve done everything you can to assert yourself. You can rest now because you’ve worked to be free” (Max Roach, quoted in Hentoff 1960, quoted in Jerry Jazz Musician 2014). Instead, it immediately precedes it; “Protest”, which includes frantic screaming by vocalist Abbey Lincoln, is heard over the climactic and tragic penultimate scene in which tsotsis [thugs] kill Steve,49 a cry of extreme frustration at a system that allows its citizens to be victims of arbitrary, wasteful violence. The original album’s liner notes describe the piece as follows:
PROTEST is a final, uncontrollable unleashing of rage and anger that have [sic] been compressed in fear for so long that the only catharsis can be the extremely painful tearing out of all the accumulated fury and hurt and blinding bitterness. (Hentoff 1960, quoted in Jerry Jazz Musician 2014)
The polyrhythmic percussion of the second half of “All Africa” accompanies shots of commuting. This link between drums and walking/running becomes something of a trope of 1960s African-influenced scores: Come Back, Africa, The Naked Prey and Dilemma all
49 This event has further resonances of Come Back, Africa, which also ends with Tsotsis killing a central character, namely Vinah. Both films thus avoid depiction of outright confrontation with the regime, such as the Sharpeville Massacre (though Come Back, Africa preceded it) in preference for showing the everyday social aspects of apartheid, from the petty apartheid of segregation in public spaces to the “black-on-black” violence brought on by poor living and working conditions. 142 make use of the technique. While the other two use rural instruments, Dilemma’s drumming is cosmopolitan, including African and African diasporic drummers, from Nigeria and Cuba, plus Roach himself. The film’s exclusively urban focus makes this appropriate. “Tears for Johannesburg” is used in Dilemma’s equivalent of Come Back, Africa’s shebeen scene, heard diegetically accompanying a conversation about South African politics in Anna’s house; and also over shots of a black fun/family day.
Following the opening credits, local music is foregrounded from the start, as Sam Mofokenzazi, played by Nxumalo, is shown composing a jazz number on the piano: this song functions as a recurring motif, though is never strongly associated enough with a single idea to develop symbolic significance.50 The music in this scene is not simply performed: the compositional process itself is elaborately documented, including the act of writing the score. This attention to musical detail, paired with the sequences of the jazz band in their practice room, highlights the point made earlier about the extent to which all films of this period concerned with representation of black South Africans (except Cry, the Beloved Country) use music to represent black identity. But the characters in these films live music, rather than simply consume it. Music therefore creates, rather than simply represents, identity.
Dilemma foregrounds the importance of jazz to the characters, through extra-diegetic accompaniment and full performances of diegetic songs. The latter is perhaps Dilemma’s greatest musical feat, providing visual documentation of South African jazz in the early 1960s, as African Jim did for an earlier era, and as Come Back, Africa does for Sophiatown and its intellectual figures. Dilemma captures performances by various artists in the context of a jazz band with backup singers in a large rehearsal venue. This venue is a physical manifestation of music’s role under apartheid: as discussed regarding Come Back,
50 There is an interesting editing error regarding this song at approximately [0:0:25]: at a house party, Sam is playing this song, accompanying Sophie Mgcina’s singing; it continues playing in the background during a conversation between Anna, Steve and Toby. Anna asks “Sam here tonight?”, to which Steve replies, “Ja, he’s around,” despite the fact that he is actually supposedly playing the piano in the room at that very moment. In addition, Mgcina is shown at the start of the scene as she sings the opening lines; the following shot, as she continues to be heard, shows her standing in the midst of the party, socializing instead of singing. 143
Africa, music served as a psychological escape.51 The rehearsal room functions analogously by existing almost entirely outside the narrative of the film, away from the issues affecting the central characters. None of the performers, except Nxumalo/Sam and a brief performance by Sophie Mgcina, appear outside this room, or have speaking roles. Steve’s visit to the room to inform Sam of Anna’s arrest eventually shatters the escapism and illusion of a safe haven.
The band performs four full songs in this room. I have found no reference to any of these songs, either in relation to this film or more generally. It seems stylistically unlikely that the music credit to Gideon Nxumalo (and Max Roach) is inclusive of all the music in the film.52 Possibly Nxumalo wrote all the songs played in the rehearsal room: although he is a spectator rather than performer in the performance scenes, he seems to exercise artistic control over the group. Mackay Davashe, credited as the bandleader, may be another possibility as songwriter. The band consists of tenor sax, alto sax, trombone, double bass, piano and drums.
The songs tend to focus on everyday events: they are not outrightly political, in keeping with this space as one of escape rather than resistance. Censorship prevented South African musicians from adopting outrightly political stances in their music and lyrics, with the result that songs were sometimes metaphorical or allegorical of the political environment.53 This censorship accounts for director Henning Carlsen’s need to look outside the country to source explicitly resistance-oriented musical material, namely Roach’s music, which is placed to actively engage with the narrative. I have named the songs in Dilemma according to their first lines or most obvious hooks, and listed them in order of appearance in Table 1. Notably, though not political, there is an air of negativity verging on despondence in the songs: lost lovers, failed family relations and financial problems.
51 It could also serve as a physical escape, for those musicians such as certain cast members of the international production of King Kong who opted not to return to South Africa. 52 In particular, the music heard diegetically on the radio or in clubs does not seem likely to belong to the oeuvre of either composer. 53 I am grateful to Akhona Ndzuta for suggesting this line of interpretation to me. 144
Time Title Translation Performers 0:37:43- Liphi itemba lami? Where is my hope/loved one? Mgcina and 0:38:50 chorus 0:38:50- Imali phelile The money is spent Chorus 0:40:20 0:56:58- Mama zala undi zonde Mother-in-law why do you Mgcina and 0:58:51 lani? hate me? chorus 1:06:00- uPhudi[?] wam, kudala Phudi54 left a long time ago Masinga 1:08:37 wahamba
Table 1: Diegetic performances in the rehearsal room in Dilemma
Music as metaphor of cultural production The soundtrack to the film is predominantly jazz, used to represent both whites and blacks. As with Come Back, Africa, then, the music avoids obvious juxtapositions of white and black characters or spaces, and in doing so enables subtler readings. The exception is the Schumannesque solo piano cue accompanying establishing shots of the exterior of Cecil Alexander’s mansion-like house, and once over shots of elderly whites playing lawn bowls, in contrast to the preceding scene where Anna interviews an elderly black lady recounting the story of her husband’s arrest for being in her domestic servant quarters. This cue thus comes to represent the hypocrisy of (in particular wealthy) white South Africans, who present a veneer of refinement and culture while turning a blind eye to the inequities of the social structure they belong to. The diegetic jazz otherwise used to represent them thus takes on a certain irony: they apparently enjoy the “cool” associations provided by the consumption of contemporary jazz, but not association with those who actually produce it.
This doublethink is exemplified from 0:53:45: Toby and Cecil dance together in a club to a jazz track; as they depart the club, Toby hums the song by Mofokenzazi/Nxumalo that recurs at various points through the film. When he tells Cecil that a friend of his, Sam Mofokenzazi, wrote it, she is literally unable to process the apparent contradiction of a
54 Although it recurs a number of times, I am not certain of the name used, which sounds like “Phudi”, although I have found no examples of this name in wider use. 145 friend with an African name. Henning’s portrayal of cognitive dissonance regarding jazz consumption is similar to the example cited above regarding Tom, Dirk en Herrie. Perhaps it is best understood through analogy with contemporary society’s attitude to meat consumption. The packaged item is considered an absolute: a finished, almost naturally occurring product, dissociated from the means of its production, knowledge of which could undermine enjoyment of the product itself.
The principal difference between jazz used to represent whites and blacks in the film is that the whites consume music passively, diegetically on the radio or in a club, while the blacks create the music, predominantly in the rehearsal room where Sam’s band practices, which is also heard diegetically. This pattern of music production and consumption suggests a wider model for apartheid South African society: blacks create products through manual labour, and whites consume the finished products. It is also symptomatic of a wider music- cultural trend: white South Africans, although active in cultural production, have largely succeeded only in producing isolated examples of unique and meaningful musical products. It is ironic that the heavily subsidised white arts sector55 did not lead to the creation of a sustained original regional aesthetic,56 while the black sector, repressed and largely driven into exile, proved a richer vein. Davis makes a similar point, observing, “subject people have a distinct advantage over their oppressors—they have a measure of access to the dominant culture that is denied in reverse” (1996a: 22). The problem faced by white musicians was not lack of technical skill, but rather a tendency (sometimes enforced through censorship) towards escapism and an obsession with European cultural production models, resulting in a decontextualized artistic output.
55 Each of the four provinces had its own performing arts body, which received state and provincial funding for drama, ballet, music and opera. Established in 1963, these were the Cape Performing Arts Board (CAPAB), the Performing Arts Council of the Transvaal (PACT), Performing Arts Council of the Orange Free State (PACOFS) and the Natal Performing Arts Council (NAPAC). See ESAT (2011). For an interesting first-hand account of involvement in CAPAB, see Gobbato (no date), and for a history of the organization and its activities, see Blanckenburg (2009). Film was also subsidized from 1956 onwards, as discussed in the Introduction and Chapter 1. See also Appendix D. 56 This remains an issue for contemporary concert music in South Africa, whether produced by white or black composers. Electronic music, which by its nature carries fewer cultural associations and provides the possibility of aesthetic integration across a wide array of resources from the popular to the avant-garde, would seem to offer a way forward. 146
Concluding remarks A thread running through the films discussed in this chapter is the transplantation of representation, musically and otherwise, from an African American context to a black South African context, and the musical and structural implications of this transplantation as an effective means of achieving a desired political end. Transplantation is apparent in the structure of African Jim (and its jazz ensemble performances) and in the prevalence of Roach’s We Insist! in the narrative of Dilemma. Aside from the aspirational element introduced into African Jim, these transplantations also further politicize both films, drawing specific parallels between the two countries regarding individual rights and freedoms. In contrast, in Come Back, Africa, although directed by an American, transplantation of representation is less apparent, as the film bases its musical content on the foregrounding of indigenous styles, both rural and urban. This is the result of Rogosin’s determination to develop and present an “African” perspective of South African life, which, assisted by Nkosi and Modisane as co-writers, he achieved, more so than African Jim or Dilemma were able to. African American popular music influence is limited to a street-musician performance of Elvis Presley’s “Teddy Bear”, and residual traces in Miriam Makeba’s three songs (two in the shebeen and one on the radio), in a style that by this stage in history had developed a uniquely South African flavour. The last point applies equally to Dilemma’s diegetic performances.
Depictions of the musicians, then, provide evidence of a growing maturity of musical representation over the ten-year period from African Jim to Come Back, Africa, and thence to Dilemma, in which the artists successfully develop the resources for their own representation, rather than identifying themselves in terms of the representative models of others. “Borrowing” of representational models, as occurs in African Jim, constitutes a start on the journey towards musical representation. Come Back, Africa presents a more mature representation, focussing on a broad cross section of musical activities and styles, predominantly of indigenous material, and internationally showcasing for the first time one of South Africa’s most influential artists, Miriam Makeba, performing material entirely South African in flavour. Dilemma goes further than straightforward showcasing, depicting influential South African jazz musicians in rehearsal and during the process of creation. Although Come Back, Africa is immersed in music, it is not a film about 147 musicians; Dilemma, on the other hand, partially is, and is thus better placed to demonstrate how music does not just represent identity but also creates it. Yet, it also regresses representationally through relying on American jazz instead of South African jazz for the extra-diegetic narrative accompaniment. This choice impedes the representational possibilities of black South African musicians by denying their music the opportunity to represent beyond themselves; but the use of American jazz also opens up new fields of representation through the links it forges between American and South African liberation struggles.
Of the films discussed in this chapter, all have limited success integrating expression of African musical material with the narrative and visual elements to further the narrative, or enhance the film’s expressive elements. Music remains predominantly diegetic, and largely separate from narrative, dragging the plot to a halt when it appears. There are exceptions: Jim’s song in African Jim furthers the narrative action through his performance, which is both entertainment on two narrative levels (Ingoma club audience and filmic audience) and demonstration to the record producer of his singing abilities, leading to the resolution of the narrative arc of “Jim coming to Joburg”.57 Dolly’s song also has narrative impact: the lyrics are appropriate to the theme of the film, namely African urbanization, and Dolly’s performance is the catalyst for Jim’s romantic interest in her, suggested by the cuts between her singing and Jim’s face. Parts of Come Back, Africa also successfully utilize African music to further the expressive elements of the film, most notably the mbira cue paired with the demolished house in the opening credits, and the bow and drum cues throughout; yet the drum cues are only debatably African. The plot is progressed by Zach’s listening to the radio; yet it is the act of doing so, not the music itself, that serves as the catalyst for further action. Dilemma manages to integrate Roach’s We Insist! effectively with the visuals and narrative, despite the music pre-dating the film; but its non-South African status detracts from its relevance, at least from the current study’s perspective.
57 Although this film is near-universally referred to as Jim Comes to Joburg, there seems to be no basis for this title; the title credits name the film African Jim. 148 Chapter 5 Afrikaner Nationalism and Film Music
I alluded to certain features of the musical representation of Afrikaner nationalism at the end of Chapter 2, and explored how Afrikaner nationalism can also be expressed through rural African music in relation to Building a Nation and Simon Beyers in Chapter 3. I now return to the topic in this chapter for a more extensive analysis of the phenomenon. In doing so, I enact a shift in strategic approach. The two preceding chapters look at what is represented by two particular genres of music—in each case, the musical genre is a constant, while what is represented is a variable. In practice, however, the subject of representation is nearly always the creators of the music, namely black South Africans. The current chapter looks at how different genres of music represent a particular concept— what is represented is a constant, while musical genre is a variable. This demonstrates how the musical portrayal of nationalism draws on a wide variety of existing musical tropes not necessarily associated with nationalist ideology, repurposing them to achieve a nationalist aim through narrative recontextualization. This recontextualization is not monolithic— strategies of musically representing nationalism vary according to context, across a continuum from martial heroics to bourgeois sentimentalism. I use such categories as the basis for a discussion of strategies of nationalist representation. Before embarking on this discussion, however, I explore certain thematic and structural similarities between African- oriented and Afrikaner nationalist film. My aim in doing so is to address the issue of the industry’s fragmentation, a direct result of the country’s social/racial fragmentation. Despite the varied objectives, character and target audience of these fragments, similarities exist that speak to some level of shared experience of being South African and of functioning within the constraints of a South African film industry. It is worth exploring these to move towards an understanding of the nature of style in the industry, and whether fundamental similarities exist that work across the borders of the points on the political continuum responsible for the industry’s fragmentation. 149
My discussion of Afrikaner nationalism is not a discussion of the Afrikaner people as a cultural, ethnic, language or political group and all those who are a part of it—it is specifically a discussion of the ideology of Afrikaner nationalism. I focus particularly on how my interpretation of Afrikaner nationalism during the period under review is constructed through film music. Doing so necessitates an exploration of the extent to which the films of the era can be viewed in this light, and does not imply that the Afrikaner people as a whole are culturally, ideologically or politically monolithic.
Afrikaner nationalist vs African-oriented films Although in some cases politically diametrically opposed, there are significant similarities between the conventions of cinema focussing on Afrikaner1 lives, and cinema (discussed in Chapter 3 and Chapter 4) focussing on black South African lives. Notably, both foreground music: most films, however, are not strictly musicals in the sense of cast members periodically erupting into song; they are closer to vaudeville, where the action frequently halts to allow musical acts to take centre stage and perform one or more numbers. This vaudeville approach seems to be an especially South African phenomenon. Hollywood would typically follow conventions of the musical, in which the lead actors themselves are the musical/dance performers, thus integrating the musical number into the stream of action. Alternatively, in a non-musical, a musical act in a nightclub might receive a few seconds’ focus prior to receding into the background, continuing softly behind a dialogue scene. At the other extreme, a film such as The Hollywood Revue of 1929 (1929 dir. Charles Reisner) includes only staged performances with no plot. South African film blurs these conventions: an otherwise non-musical film will halt the diegesis to include performances of full songs by acts with no further part in the film. This will be cued Hollywood style, by a device such as the lead characters visiting some kind of music
1 I use the term “Afrikaner” in the same sense as the Oxford English Dictionary, namely “A Dutch- speaking or (later) Afrikaans-speaking white inhabitant of South Africa, usually of Dutch, German, or Huguenot descent” (Oxford English Dictionary 2016a). Afrikaners, in other words, are a subset of the total population who speak Afrikaans, as there are many coloured speakers of the language as well. The term “Afrikaner” is a cultural signifier, while “Afrikaans” denotes a language rather than a culture. 150 performance venue—a nightclub or village dance, for instance. But the performance will retain attention until it is finished.
The appearance of these generic conventions in both white- and black-oriented film may be the result of mutual influence; the convention in both oeuvres started nearly simultaneously in 1949, with Kom Saam, Vanaand and African Jim, both following a vaudeville-like format for some portion of their running time. The reasons for this approach to form in either body of work are simultaneously similar and very different. For black audiences, as discussed in Chapter 4, frequent inclusion of music was aspirational, political and probably related to available economic opportunities under apartheid (of which there were very few besides music and boxing, barring manual labour). For white audiences, aspiration and politics were also integral, albeit on the separate tier of the social hierarchy apartheid reserved for them.
These aims were mostly achieved through escapism, however. While African-oriented film had an interest in promoting change, Afrikaans film had an interest in deflecting it.2 Afrikaner nationalists having achieved political dominance in 1948, subsequent films aimed to maintain the status quo, consolidate Afrikaner culture and provide role models for Afrikaner society. Common examples of such role models are the polite and pretty daughter, the strong and responsible son, the gruff but kind father and the wholesome, loving volksmoeder [mother of the nation], typically found in the context of upper middle class suburban or rural life. Aside from these political functions, such films suggest a growing amount of leisure time, synonymous with an increasingly wealthy urban population.3 Kuhn (1990: 376) attributes the escapism trend in the 1950s to overcompensation after “a grim period of deprivation during World War II”. Frequent inclusion of boeremusiek has a twofold purpose: promotion of Afrikaner cultural practice and increasing a film’s popularity through the performance of enjoyable songs.4 The
2 Such films as Zonk! and Song of Africa, however, are aligned to the mainstream industry, and thus have an interest in maintaining the status quo. 3 See Beck (2014: 188-122) regarding government policies enacted in the 1920s and 1930s to assist the growth of Afrikaner wealth and capital. 4 Also, as Davis (1996b) points out, “Night-club films [i.e. films incorporating staged performances] were an excuse to feature the talents of one or more entertainers, injections into predominantly B-movies to beef up a weak plot”. 151 introduction of the drive-in, which according to Botha (2012: 53, fn.1) “became a reality in South Africa in the early 1950s”, also had an important effect on content. The actual film was only a part of the drive-in experience: attendance was for social reasons as much as for viewing a specific film. Under these conditions, intricate plotting and social commentary is secondary to accessible family entertainment, which musical numbers provided irrespective of their thematic relationship to the film. Tomaselli quotes film critic John van Zyl, speaking in 1976, on the drive-in phenomenon:
The non-discriminatory patronage of the drive-in circuit which boasts a captive audience is a situation which does not exist in any other country. The drive-in is an integral part of the South African entertainment system and generally people who patronize these outlets make little effort to find out whether what is on is worth seeing. Therefore where South African made films are concerned, there is little doubt that they will reach the subsidy qualification.5 (1988: 46)
Thematically, the most common element to Afrikaans and African-oriented films is urbanization, voluntary or otherwise. This theme’s centrality to African Jim, Cry, the Beloved Country, Song of Africa, Come Back, Africa and Dingaka was discussed in Chapter 3 and Chapter 4. In Afrikaans cinema, the urbanization theme is central to Moedertjie, Geboortegrond and Daar Doer in die Stad. More generally, the contrast between rural and urban modes of being is integral to many films, including ‘n Plan is ‘n Boerdery (1954 dir. Pierre de Wet), Die Vlugteling (1960 dir. Gordon Vorster), Oupa en die Plaasnooientjie (1960 dir. Pierre de Wet), En die Vonke Spat (1961 dir. Pierre de Wet) and Debbie (1965 dir. Elmo de Witt). Musically, Afrikaans film expresses the urban/rural schism less distinctively: frequently, light orchestral library music is used indiscriminately for both. A general difference in scoring treatment does, however, arise between diegetic boeremusiek, performed on-screen in rural environments, and jazz, used extra-diegetically
5 The film subsidy in South Africa was based on box-office receipts: after a film earned a certain amount of box-office revenue, it qualified for the subsidy. This served to undermine quality, ensuring films were aimed at the lowest common denominator. See Chapter 2 of Tomaselli (1988) for further information on the mechanics and effects of the subsidy system. 152 to represent the apartheid city space—an irony the films themselves fail to acknowledge.6 Such use represents an attempt to “borrow” models of musical representation, as discussed in Chapter 4, though here the representation is transplanted across racial, cultural and economic borders, and represents a form of appropriation.
Nationalist strategies in Afrikaans cinema Afrikaner nationalist film is by no means monolithic: the ideological framework extends across the period of this study, over numerous genres and themes both historical and contemporaneous. Table 2 presents a list of some of the principal themes serving as a vehicle for the nationalist metanarrative, together with examples of films demonstrating these themes. The list is extensible depending on how broadly one addresses the topic. The comedies of Al Debbo and/or Frederik Burgers, for instance, take for granted the society around them: race relations toe the apartheid line, presenting South Africa as a purely white space smattered with occasional black servants.7 The approach to music in these films, produced by African Film Productions in the late 1940s to 1950s, adheres to a strict template: they use orchestral library music, drawn from a pool of cues available to the production company.8 Films like As Ons Twee Eers Getroud is (1962) are deeply nationalist in portraying a hermetic system of Afrikaner suburban family life rooted in a strong tradition of bourgeois values, presented with light-hearted sentimentality and
6 See, for instance, the discussion of Tom, Dirk en Herrie in relation to Come Back, Africa in Chapter 4. 7 These films form a body of work all their own that have received minimal scholarly attention, and none regarding their music. Their particular approach to music—a mixture of extra-diegetic library music (frequently re-using the same cues across different films) and diegetic boeremusiek— deserves study in its own right, having developed into a South African aesthetic. Space constraints in the current study preclude discussion of these films, of which there are many. Examples include Hyman Kirstein’s Hier’s Ons Weer (1950) and Alles sal Regkom (1951); Pierre de Wet’s Altyd in my Drome (1952), ‘n Plan is ‘n Boerdery (1954), Matieland (1955), Dis Lekker om te Lewe (1957), Fratse in die Vloot (1958), Piet se Tante (1959) and En die Vonke Spat (1961); Al Debbo’s Boerboel de Wet (1961) and Tom, Dirk en Herrie (1962); and Jan Perold’s Piet my Niggie (1964). 8 The number of these cues is quite limited, so that the same cues are often reused in different films. The available cue library could possibly be reconstructed from the company’s filmic output. I have tried, unsuccessfully, to establish the fate of this library. Reuse of library music cues was not constrained to African Film Productions, however: even Sarie Marais (1949), a Unifilms production, makes use of at least one cue used by African Film Productions. Compare, for instance, 0:26:33 of Sarie Marais with 1:16:20 of Simon Beyers. Additionally, cues are distinct to certain eras and genres: comedies of the late 1940s to 1950s access one pool of cues, while dramas access another, and 1960s war/action films once more have their own repertory. 153 completely abstracted from the greater reality of South Africa’s sociopolitical environment.
Historical Contemporaneous
Early history: Urbanization: Building a Nation (1938) Moedertjie (1931) L Simon Beyers (1947) L9 Geboortegrond (1946) Daar Doer in die Stad (1954) L Great Trek: Inspan (1953) L Family intrigue: Untamed (1955) Hans die Skipper (1953) L Geheim van Onderplaas (1962) L Diamonds: Debbie (1965) Kimberley Jim (1963) Geheim van Nantes (1969) 1st and 2nd South African Wars: Suspense: Sarie Marais (1931) The Second Sin (1966) Sarie Marais (1949) L Paul Krüger (1956) Music: Die Ruiter in die Nag (1963) L Kom Saam, Vanaand (1949) Die Kavaliers (1966) Hoor my Lied (1967) Kruger Miljoene (1967) Jy is my Liefling (1968) Majuba (1968) Danie Bosman (1969)
Table 2: Afrikaner nationalist films by theme
Some of the films in Table 2 explicitly promote a nationalist agenda, stating their political convictions in so many words: Building a Nation and Simon Beyers are unambiguous in this regard.10 Others choose settings that are important historical milestones in Afrikaner
9 “L” following the film’s title denotes that the film uses library music. 10 See van Staden and Sevenhuysen (2009) for a discussion of the role and significance of these two films in the Afrikaner community. 154 nationalist mythology, such as the Great Trek and the South African Wars.11 Some promote nationalism through setting their stories against an implicit background of nationalist ideology, such as in films focussing on the family group, normalizing a set of family values “expected” from an Afrikaner audience. Lastly is the promotion of nationalism through a glorification of white South African cultural achievement. This often occurs against a background of natural beauty, displaying white South Africa as a cosmopolitan bastion of international talent surrounded by edenic scenery. The scenery, of course, is highly contested terrain (literally), which these films participate in laying claim to for white South Africa. I categorize these four methods of nationalist promotion as “manifesto”, “mythologized”, “bourgeois” and “utopian” nationalism. These categories are the basis for my discussion of film music in nationalist-oriented South African film.
For space reasons, this study will limit discussion to the first three categories. To comment briefly on the final category of utopian nationalism, Hoor my Lied is the archetypal example. It is a fuller reworking of Kom Saam, Vanaand. A girl, who is a talented singer, is paralysed from the waist down, and funds are needed for treatment in America. Physical disability is a popular trope of South African cinema in the period under discussion in this study.12 Its use is an escapist melodramatic technique, allowing generation of faux emotion and thus avoidance of real-life issues. It is therefore perfectly suited to the South African film industry at this time, which is based on escapism from the country’s sociopolitical realities. Jy is my Liefling and Danie Bosman are further examples of representation of Afrikaner nationalism through an image of picture-perfect, wholesome social morality, resulting in a strong sense of kitsch. Comedy redeems them slightly, however, through lead actor Franz Marx’s self-deprecatory humour.
The music in Afrikaner nationalist films can serve to create the "sound of apartheid". An idealized apartheid is visibly written into the films' content, and the music accompanies this visual depiction. Apartheid film attempts to present the system as it was meant to be,
11 Naming conventions for these conflicts differ. See footnote 16 on page 72 regarding my choice of terminology. 12 See for instance Simon Beyers (crippled through illness), Pinkie se Erfenis (one character blind, another crippled), Kom Saam, Vanaand (crippled), Rip van Wyk (blindness), Journey to Nowhere (blindness) and Hoor my Lied (one blind, one crippled). 155 rather than as it actually was. The music is thus a non-verbal, emotionally expressive distillation of apartheid mentality. The expression of this mentality veers between earthy comedy, melodramatic self-involved seriousness, bombast and sickly-sweet sentimentality. Obsessive escapism marks all these attitudes. These elements of apartheid film constitute apartheid’s public facade, demonstrating how white South Africa wished to see itself, and how it wished to be seen.
This is the norm of apartheid film; against this background, a film occasionally attempts to break free of this mind prison. When this happens, the quality of the music changes as well. Musical functions expand beyond pratfall-inspired bassoon solos, muted trumpet blares, trombone slides and lightweight, bustling orchestral cues, devoid of purpose besides filling space as characters commute from setpiece to setpiece. Nor are they constrained to over-the-top dramatic cues attempting to lend an air of importance to family scandal. They are also free of kitsch sentimentalism glorifying love. Such films, which espouse a relatively liberal position in contrast to the conservative surrounding ethos, require additional study; I briefly discuss them further under “Suggestions for further research” in the Conclusion chapter.
Manifesto nationalism: pioneers Manifesto nationalism presents nationalist ideology most explicitly, the film itself expressing its political aims and affiliations in so many words. I discussed the two clearest examples of this phenomenon, Building a Nation and Simon Beyers, in Chapter 2 and Chapter 3. I will therefore not dwell on them again here beyond brief comment regarding representation of nationalism through film music in Simon Beyers.
Simon Beyers (1947) Given the centrality of the Great Trek mythology to Afrikaner nationalist heritage, it is not surprising that costume drama played a significant role in early South African film. De Voortrekkers and Building a Nation were important milestones in Afrikaner nationalist mythology, celebrating the battle of Blood River and the Great Trek respectively. Simon Beyers does not take place on the epic scale of these earlier costume dramas—in fact, it is mostly filmed in a single room, clearly signifying its stage-play origins, also noticeable in 156 its clear act structure. The distribution of music is likewise most closely akin to theatrical incidental music. It confines itself to a predominantly structural role, providing atmospheric music at the transitions between acts and not engaging with the actors or dialogue until nearly the halfway point. At this point, it is used to foreground one of the central moments of the film during which Simon Beyers, at the end of Act 2, states his manifesto—a central dramatic motivation for the film and an important statement of Afrikaner nationalist ideology.
As the film progresses and the drama intensifies to its climax, music use increases in quantity and intensity. It does not merely support the climax points, but is instrumental in creating them—Maria’s departure; her discovery of Nicolaas; their return; and the final binding together of Simon, Maria and their newly adopted baby into a family unit, all become structural and emotional climax points through the foregrounding of music. The scoring style therefore shifts within the film from incidental, theatrical, structural scoring in Acts 1, 2 and 3 to dramatic, filmic, expressive scoring in Acts 4 and 5. This happens abruptly, when the musicless, dialogue-heavy play format metamorphoses into a filmic montage accompanied by an array of music styles. The musical vocabulary shifts through a range of styles of Romanticism, from Brahmsian [1:10:50], directly into a waltz that sounds like the title theme of a 1940s romantic drama [1:11:23], to Rimsky-Korsakov- inflected exoticism [1:13:10], to pastoral idyll [1:17:00], to the Richard Strauss-influenced kitsch of contemporaneous Hollywood love-scene scoring [1:19:10].
The themes of nationalism and patriarchy are central. Culminating Act 2 [0:48:46], Simon Beyers soliloquizes about his arrival in a wild land and his creation, stone by stone, of Welgelegen, his farm, taming the wild through hard work with his own hands. Beyers thus espouses a central narrative of Afrikaner nationalist philosophy, and two of the central claims for the legitimacy of colonial rule—hard work as capital for earning land ownership, and the introduction of civilized practices.13 Underscore supports the speech—the first extra-diegetic underscore accompanying the narrative, as opposed to filling in the transitions between acts. As a generator of meaning in relation to the narrative, its
13 For further discussion of the nationalist ideology in Simon Beyers generally and this scene particularly, see Riley (2012: 34-41). 157 placement underneath Beyers’s speech limits its impact, which requires it to remain muted in volume. The (library music) cue harnesses certain tropes of musical meaning in support of Beyers’s speech, however. The cue begins softly with limited instrumental forces, and undergoes an increase in volume and instrumentation, which provides a quality of increasing fervour and enthusiasm to the first part of the monologue. Beyers describes how, single-handedly, “die wildernis het ek omskep in ‘n paradys” [from the wilderness I created a paradise; 0:49:23].
From whose perspective it is a paradise is made unambiguous by the musical accompaniment, which after this point moves towards tropes of the pastoral, signifying in this context the rural idyll Beyers has created. The melody passes to the horn, then the oboe—two instruments strongly associated with the pastoral trope—and a sequence of uplifting pastoral-associated ascending major 3rd modulations occurs, including some slow wind trills reminiscent in expressive effect to Maurice Ravel’s rapid, repeated wind figures in the ballet Daphnis and Chloe (1912), which he uses to achieve his Arcadian pastoral tone-painting. The pastoral trope is a recurring phenomenon in South African film music. Its transplantation from an ideal of European agrarianism to a South African context is itself a musical signifier of nationalism in its interpretation of the nature of South African landscape and its implicit claims about land ownership and land rights. Beyers does not consider the relativistic nature of paradise, but assumes the term applies purely to the European model of agrarian land ownership situated somewhere between feudalism and capitalism—and thus paradisaical only for landed Europeans. Applying the pastoral idyll to the South African landscape implicitly assumes ownership of that land by those who see it in this light, and interprets it in strictly European terms regarding its nature and use. Through European eyes, it is a potential but unharnessed agrarian paradise rather than an already-harnessed natural paradise, to be exploited and transformed rather than harvested sustainably.
Simon Beyers is a stern figure, though without the bitterness of other characters in similar roles. Diegetic music undermines his stern persona—he demonstrates obvious pleasure in singing and dancing, during which he abandons his sternness, and sings humorous songs to the baby when he thinks no one is nearby. The stern, even tyrannical father figure is a 158 recurring motif in the films of the 1940s to 1960s, integrally associated with Afrikaner nationalism through the patriarchal metanarrative. The narratives of Geboortegrond and Pinkie se Erfenis are steered by the tyranny of Koos Vermaas and Oom Piet respectively (both played by Jan Brill). The stern patriarch theme is continued in the later Hans die Skipper (1953), which like Geboortegrond revolves around a son’s attempts to live up to his father’s ideals. It recurs in Wild Season (1967), a virtual reworking of Hans die Skipper; though the film exposes the psychological underpinnings of the father figure, Dirk Maritz, treating his absurd stubbornness with humour. This is in contrast to the father figures of Geboortegrond and Pinkie, portrayed as terrifying in their volatile bitterness, and whose psychological issues responsible for their sociopathic behaviour remain unexplored. I continue discussion of this theme below.
Mythologized nationalism: films of the South African Wars This section studies five films about the South African Wars. These are Die Ruiter in die Nag ([The Rider in the Night] 1963 dir. Jan Perold), Die Kavaliers ([The Cavaliers] 1966 dir. Elmo de Witt) and its sequel Kruger Miljoene ([Kruger Millions] 1967 dir. Ivan Hall), Majuba (1968 dir. David Millin) and Paul Krüger14 (1956 dir. Werner Grünbauer). The composer for Die Kavaliers and Kruger Miljoene is Con Lamprecht,15 one of the more prolific South African film composers of the period. Bob Adams and Joe Kentridge, who scored a considerable number of South African films in the late 1960s, scored Majuba. Die Ruiter in die Nag uses library music. Paul Krüger addresses the South African Wars as a subset of Kruger’s term as President of the South African Republic.16 The film makes use of library music and excerpts of classical works, particularly Jean Sibelius’s 1899
14 Some films with the word “Kruger” in the title include an umlaut on the “u”, while others do not. I follow whichever convention each film title uses. When referring to Paul Kruger the person I use no umlaut, as is the convention. 15 Die Kavaliers provides no composer credit. The source for the composer credit is the film’s IMDb page. I am not aware of that page’s source. Stylistically, Con Lamprecht is plausible, and the score is written in response to the visuals, and is thus not library music. Lamprecht is the credited composer for the film’s sequel, Kruger Miljoene. Taking these factors together, I consider it safe to rely on the claim that Lamprecht is the composer for Die Kavaliers. 16 The South African Republic is not to be confused with the Republic of South Africa. The former refers to the Boer republic situated in the Transvaal area in the north of present-day South Africa, in existence from 1852-1902. The latter came into existence in 1961, and remains the official name of South Africa. 159
Finlandia, Op.26, though also includes some additional diegetic musical treatment relevant to the topic under discussion.17
Other South African War films exist that could also, given space, be included: Sarie Marais (1949 dir. Francis Coley), Voor Sononder (1962 dir. Emil Nofal), Strangers at Sunrise (1969 dir. Percival Rubens), and even the German Nazi-era film Ohm Krüger (1941 dir. Hans Steinhoff). I have chosen to focus on the five mentioned because they all take the “big picture” view: the South African Wars are their theme, rather than simply a backdrop for interpersonal drama, for instance, as is the case with Sarie Marais, Voor Sononder and Strangers at Sunrise. Ohm Krüger, while technically dealing with a South African topic, has more to do with German-English relations than South African history.
The South African War films are unerringly favourable towards the Boers: they are a reflection of how Afrikaner society of the 1960s would have liked others to see it. Specifically, they present the Boers as straightforward, loyal, brave, fair and honest, with the exception of the verraaiers [traitors], a narrative trope central to both Kruger Miljoene and Die Ruiter in die Nag. The verraaiers pose the greatest threat to the Boers’ success, through their willingness to collaborate with the British in exchange for personal financial gain. They also highlight, however, what is portrayed as the Boers’ greatest strength, namely their camaraderie and interpersonal trust, in contrast to the British, who are bound by a purely professional military hierarchy. The British, although usually portrayed as more affected, are generally presented in a relatively favourable light. The films omit the worst atrocities of both groups: slavery and violence against indigenous populations by Boers, and British concentration camps for holding thousands of Boer women and children, and even larger numbers of Africans,18 in conditions that caused death on a massive scale. At the time of production of these films, the Afrikaner nationalists were secure in their power base. Allying with English-speakers and bringing them into the apartheid fold was therefore more advantageous than isolating them—a proportion of the English vote was necessary for the nationalists to retain power. Generally, although all these South African
17 Plot summaries for Paul Krüger, Die Ruiter in die Nag, Die Kavaliers, Kruger Miljoene and Majuba are available at M-Net Corporate (2015). 18 See Kessler (2012). 160
War films depict English and Afrikaans at war, they also present an underlying civility, real or imagined, between the two sides.
The films discussed in this section (besides Paul Krüger, which differs in scope and design) have a number of features in common. They date from the 1960s; they address the conflict between Boer and British; they treat the South African Wars and South Africa generally in terms of white Afrikaans/English relations;19 they are pro-Boer, though they emphasize a Boer-British affinity; and music is integral in signifying political allegiance through representation. The music undermines any claim towards objectivity, and attempts to ally the viewer to the Boers’ cause.
Myth creation and heroism Mythical characters Absence characterizes these films, generated by the myth that South Africa is a white- owned country, fought over purely by British and Boers. Rather than presenting the “South African War”, a more inclusive term accounting for black South African involvement, they present the “Anglo-Boer War”.20 Black players do not appear at all in some cases, and in others appear only briefly in servant roles. In Die Kavaliers, the eponymous “self-moord kommando” [suicide commando; 0:01:40] would, in reality, likely have included an army of servants to cook and make camp, and also the servants’ families, who had no livelihood when left at home without the main breadwinner (see Nasson 2013: 135). Instead, the Kavaliers are purely a fighting force: no servants, no nurses, no children to support the adults with ammunition-loading etc. The Kavaliers are thus a mythical force, superheroes possessing almost supernatural powers; so familiar are they in their native land that they
19 Based on these films, one would never surmise that by 1911 only 21% of the population was white, in comparison with an African population of 67% (South African History Online1 (no date)). 20 Nasson (2013: 127) provides the following figures regarding African involvement:
At least 100,000 and perhaps as many as 120,000 African and coloured men were pulled into the British war effort… possibly as many as 50,000 of these may have been under arms in authorized imperial service…. What of the republicans’ use of coerced or collaborative black resources? … the Boers used around 10,000 African and coloured people as non-combatant labourers and service workers, while at least 10,000 and perhaps as many as 14 000 trusted men were mobilized as mounted gun-bearers or agterryers, thrust into action as vital commando logistical reinforcements. 161 can survive without any requirements of a normal military force, including food supplies and first aid. They can even, as at the end of Kruger Miljoene, summon and control the forces of nature in the form of stampeding elephants to defeat overwhelming British odds. On the one occasion where first aid is a necessity, they dupe the British into providing it for them [Kruger Miljoene, 0:36:14].
Both Die Kavaliers and Kruger Miljoene, then, rely on the myth of the Kavaliers superhero guerrilla commando. Die Ruiter in die Nag likewise establishes its protagonist as a mythical guerrilla freedom-fighter figure. Use of library music considerably curtails the film’s ability to express its allegiance, however, as I discuss further below. Majuba, in contrast to the mythical scenario construction of the other three films, is based on a historical event. I will demonstrate, however, how the music assists in mythologizing this event.
Heroic themes A primary nationalist strategy of these films is signification of allegiance through heroic musical themes. These are particularly prominent in Die Kavaliers and Majuba, which opt for a neo-primitive orchestral style of prominent perfect 5th intervals and angular horn melodies. These characteristics place the Boers within the world of quasi-Wagnerian mythology, evoking images of horned-helmeted heroes. As I demonstrate, this is simply one thread of a quite prominent Germanic influence running through the music of the films in this section.
Example 8 presents a transcription of the “Kavaliers” theme21 from Die Kavaliers [first heard at 0:02:38]. The passage’s most characteristic element is the angular melody line, emphasizing movement in perfect 4th and major 2nd intervals to create a bare, 3rd-less sound. The four notes constituting the entire melody (passed between the horn and the violins) are all immediate neighbours on the circle of 5ths, which is apparent when arranged in the order G♭-D♭-A♭-E♭. The harmonic movement is also strongly characterful: the 5th-based melody is accompanied by prominent perfect 5th-oriented material, as the lower brass alternates between perfect 5ths on D♭ and a minor 3rd higher on F♭, creating parallel 5ths
21 This is my own title for the cue, based on its recurring association with them. 162 between D♭/A♭ and F♭/C♭. Parallel 5ths sound immediately prominent in an orchestral, (quasi-)classical environment because of their proscription within the common practice period. They hark back to the earlier organum style of medieval sacred music, and even earlier to when instruments made out of natural materials such as animal horns or shells were, due to their loudness, used as instruments of public display.22 For reasons unknown, the use of such prominent 5th-based material can inspire a sense of heroic resolve and transcendence of everyday prosaicness.23 The horn melody amplifies this character—a common sense approach would suggest this could be because of the historical association with the blowing of natural horns to signify actions such as war and hunting.24
Majuba‘s heroic Boer theme is most prominently heard as the Boer forces muster [0:14:25]. Example 9 presents a transcription of part of this cue [beginning 0:14:56]. As with the “Kavaliers” theme in Example 8, the theme is built prominently around perfect 5th/perfect 4th intervals, in this case E♭-B♭-F. The harmonic movement also emphasizes parallel 5ths, as in 1st and 2nd bars of Example 9: the lower strings move from E♭ to F and back, while the horns simultaneously move from B♭ to C and back,25 creating parallel 5ths a whole tone apart of E♭/B♭ to F/C.
22 Since such horns, not having valves or sophisticated mouthpieces, would only be able to play the first few fundamentals of the overtone series, the easiest notes to play would be the fundamental, its octave, and a perfect 5th above that, hence the prominence of association with the interval of the perfect 5th in relation to such instruments. 23 A good example of the prominent use of perfect 5th/perfect 4th intervals to achieve this effect is Aaron Copland’s Fanfare for the Common Man (1942). The opening theme consists of an ascending perfect 4th followed by an ascending perfect 5th: F-B♭-F, followed shortly after by two descending perfect 4ths: E♭-B♭-F, then two stacked, ascending triads spanning two perfect 5th intervals: E♭-G-B♭, B♭-D-F. 24 Trumpets and horns, while serving both war and hunting purposes, have also had many other social uses besides these, such as in ancestor rituals, funeral rites, and to communicate—talking drum-style—across large distances. See for instance Baines (1976: 38-44). 25 The B♭-A♭ quaver figure in bar 2, beat 2 of the horn part is merely a melodic elaboration of the movement from C on beat 1 to B♭ on beat 3, which according to the conventional rules of contrapuntal movement does not negate the resulting parallel 5th formed with the F-E♭ of the lower strings. 163
Example 8: "Kavaliers" theme from Die Kavaliers 164
Example 9: Boers’ theme from Majuba 165
Die Ruiter in die Nag takes a more conventional Hollywood approach to its heroic music. The cue characterizing the lead [beginning at 0:10:27] is the most explicit example of this: we see the silhouette of the mounted “ruiter” [rider] on a hilltop against a dramatic skyline, accompanied by tutti orchestra. The cue features a pentatonic trumpet and trombone melody played fortissimo over a slow harmonic tempo sustained by the low strings. Tam- tam and bass drum announce its beginning and timpani bang out a pedal point of 1ˆ and 5ˆ between the melodic phrases.26 The style is, by the 1960s, anachronistic, appropriate to a 1940s or 1950s Western, but at the tail end of the era of sweeping Romantic orchestral scores. Sarel Gericke—the “ruiter”—is a different type of national hero to those in Die Kavaliers and Majuba. There, the heroes are warriors: straightforward, brave, loyal and uncomplicated. Their strength lies in their unity. Sarel Gericke, in contrast, shifts the terrain from the heroic resolve of the many to the Romanticism of the lone hero who must make difficult decisions, possibly to his own detriment, to save others, who may curse him rather than thank him for it. Sarel therefore includes elements of the sacrificial hero archetype. His theme moves into the territory of Hollywood Romanticism: grand, sweeping melodies and ensembles of epic proportions capture the majesty of the lone hero.
Any musical meaning derived from an interpretation of library music, as used extensively in Die Ruiter in die Nag, must bear in mind that the cue is not an ideal, as one might expect from music specifically written by a composer on the instruction of the director, but is a “best fit” based on what was available in a limited pool of choices. A problem with library music is lack of integration, between individual cues and between music and visuals. Each cue is separate, with no narrative or conceptual ties to the preceding or following one. The cues do not follow the shape of the filmic narrative in general or of individual events in particular. Library music offers generic excitement, but with frequent mismatches such as musical climaxes without visual climaxes, and the need to suddenly cut the cue in full flight. It is unable to comment in detail on allegiances or representation, barring occasional serendipity. The music cannot “take sides”, responding to the fortunes of particular characters or allegiances with nuance, allowing it to make a stand in terms of political loyalty and emotional impact. Successes and failures are not signified: merely the fact that
26 This cue is also the title cue for Voor Sononder. 166 some action is taking place. This lack of particularity enables the music to engage in the same escapism many of the films themselves engage in, achieving a nationalist agenda by avoiding disruption of the apartheid norm: because library music struggles to express allegiance, it tends towards the generic, a state better able to maintain, rather than challenge, the status quo.
Conventional use of library music is likely to result in a conservative score. The cues available in the library may have been written years before, especially if the library was purchased wholesale and is no longer being expanded. Once owned, there will be a tendency to want to achieve value for money by making use of the library for some time. This may be the case with Die Ruiter in die Nag, utilizing cues in the style of a bygone era, while Hollywood and other national film industries were progressing towards genres of music better suited to 1960s film aesthetics.
Myths, heroes and representation The cues discussed above harness a variety of musical resources towards glorification of the Boer resistance. Familiar musical tropes of bravery and Romanticism establish the Boer soldiers as mythical figures—fearless warriors or Romantic heroes. Glorification of the fighting forces is implicitly linked to glorification of their cause—their bravery in the face of overwhelming odds to defend their way of life against destructive forces. The music can establish nationalist representation itself, or it can take on nationalist signification through association with visual representation of nationalist elements. More common is a mixture of these two situations, in which music and visuals function together to establish a particular interpretation, instead of one or the other being solely responsible. Meaning is thus not the domain of one or the other, but of both, either of which may be dominant in creating a particular meaning, which can pass fluidly back and forth between music and visuals.
National anthems and icons From the 1950s-1960s perspective of the films in this section, the concept of Afrikaner nationalism they promote relates to the Union of South Africa prior to 1961, and thereafter to the Republic of South Africa. The concept within the film narratives themselves, however, does not relate to either such entity, since the Union was only formed in 1910. 167
Instead, it refers to Afrikaner nationalism in the context of the independent Boer republics formed in the 19th century, particularly the South African Republic and the Orange Free State.27 The filmmakers capitalize on this fact as a means of introducing relevant musical content promoting a nationalist agenda using the national anthems of the South African Republic and the Orange Free State. Besides the anthems, other symbols of nationalism also occur, occasionally through globally familiar expressions of nationalism. These symbols may be musical, or may be accompanied by music which itself then encourages a nationalist reading. I will discuss these symbols in this section, together with national anthem usage.
The earliest example of the national anthem phenomenon occurs in Paul Krüger.28 The national anthem of the South African Republic is one of a number of nationalist icons within the film. It is sung with piano accompaniment as the South African Republic flag is re-raised after the 1881 battle of Majuba [0:35:29], where the Boers defeated the British, enabling their return to independent statehood after Britain’s attempted annexation. The flag-raising shot then cuts to a very large, ornate bible, another symbol of Afrikaner nationalist ideology, before Kruger takes his presidential oath upon the same bible.29 While this anthem may now seem like no more than a historical relic, it would have been, and remains, a source of national pride for some members of the Afrikaner community, with its symbolism of past glory. The following comment accompanying a YouTube performance of the anthem makes clear that the defunct Boer republics remain symbols of conservative Afrikaner nationalist pride: “Mag hierdie volkslied, saam met Die Stem, as inspirasie dien vir die Afrikaner se vryheidstrewe!” [May this anthem, together with Die Stem,30 serve as inspiration for the Afrikaners’ struggle for freedom!] (Verwoerdburg (2007)).
27 The South African Republic existed from 1852-1902. The Orange Free State existed from 1854- 1902. Both republics became British colonies at the close of the 2nd South African War. 28 Paul Krüger predominantly uses library music. The credit for “musiekleiding [music conducting]—Stephen Eyssen” thus at first seems anomalous. It likely refers to the few cues with a particularly South African influence, probably recorded specifically for the film—the South African Republic national anthem, some choral singing during the building of the stone cairn on Paardekraal [0:33:12], and the singing of “Sarie Marais” by the Boer commando [1:13:20]. 29 For a recording of the national anthem of the South African Republic, see Flag&Anthem (2012). 30 Die Stem was the national anthem of the Republic of South Africa during the years of apartheid. 168
Music establishes Paul Krüger‘s nationalist agenda from the outset: a strongly nationalist icon, the opening of Sibelius’s Finlandia, accompanies the opening credits. Finlandia was written as an explicitly nationalist statement of Finnish independence after years of Russian occupation; its narrative structure covers “political subjugation, sudden awakening and conflict, and a nationally centred hymnic liberation into the future” (Hepokoski and Dalhström (no date)). Paul Krüger thus borrows wholesale symbols of Finland’s nationalist struggle and imports them into the context of the South African Republic, one struggle serving metaphorically for the other: Russia is Britain, and the Finns the Afrikaners. Such a metaphor also invokes a legitimacy to the Afrikaner cause through association with the Finnish cause: while the Russian/Finnish metaphor is apt in terms of the greedy imperialism of the British, it paints the Boers as victims defending their homeland, when their own claim to the land remains controversial.31 Chronologically, the choice of music is highly appropriate. Finlandia was written in 1899, revised in 1900 and published in 1901, all during the 2nd South African War of 1899-1902.
In addition to the South African Republic anthem and the anthemic Finlandia, a third icon of nationalism occurs: the meeting of the Boer forces at Paardekraal prior to the outbreak of the 1st South African War. This culminated in the creation of the Republic’s ruling triumvirate, an ultimatum sent to the British, and a stone cairn, later formalized into the Paardekraal Monument.32 A hymn-like tune sung by an all-male choir accompanies the scene, placed low in the mix [0:33:12]. The music cements the association between Afrikaner Calvinist religious ideology and Afrikaner nationalism, which are largely inseparable concepts.
31 The controversy around British and Boer land appropriation remains a dominant and emotive force in South Africa’s contemporary political landscape, a central campaigning platform for parties such as the Economic Freedom Fighters, who were successful in garnering 6.35% of the national vote (Electoral Commission of South Africa: 2014) despite having been formed only a year before the elections. 32 The scene is shot by firelight at night; fire seems to take on a nationalist symbolism across the oeuvre of South African films. Examples occur in Danie Bosman (1969 dir. Elmo de Witt), where a torchlight parade takes place to the Voortrekker Monument, and in the opening credits of Kruger Miljoene, where a fiery K (standing for Kruger) is emblazoned on the screen. The association with fascism and race hate groups through these icons is unfortunate, but possibly not entirely coincidental; the black shirts of the Kavaliers and the Germanic oompah-like nature of many of Gé Korsten’s songs in Kruger Miljoene do not assist in dissipating these associations. 169
Paardekraal is also the location of the second filmic appearance of the anthem of the South African Republic: this occurs in Majuba. Majuba‘s approach to the events on Paardekraal is far more dispassionate. The Paul Krüger Paardekraal takes place at night, the camera at ground level with a bonfire burning directly in front of it, as one of the Boer leaders passionately recites the covering letter of the ultimatum to the British, filled with emotive metaphors and references to almighty God. The Majuba version [0:17:00], by contrast, is filmed during the day. A voice-over narrator reads the dialogue, which is thus extra- diegetic. The text read is from the ultimatum itself, and is entirely factual in nature, without emotive or metaphorical language. It behaves more like a documentary than a feature film. The anthem, heard during the reading of the ultimatum, takes on the character of a historical document, rather than a call to patriotism. The anthem is arranged for orchestra, without singing, thereby negating its potential for emotive expression of lyrical content. The two scenes offer two different strategies regarding the promotion of their nationalist agendas: Paul Krüger sets out an emotive, rousing call to action, while Majuba attempts to corroborate the events of its narrative and thus its own interpretation of those events through recourse to a dispassionate, supposedly unbiased historical account.
Die Ruiter in die Nag provides the third anthemic occurrence.33 Concerned with events around the border of the Orange Free State and the Cape Colony, in the Boers’ final culminating victory they sing the national anthem of the Orange Free State.34 The Boer commando, on horseback, crosses the fortified railway line intended to prevent their escape as the British enact a pincer movement to surround them. As they cross the line, diegetic singing of unison a cappella all-male voices is heard. Coming as it does at the end of the film, and the culmination of the Boers’ victory over the British forces, it serves to concretize the larger picture of the action through establishing the victory as a national, and thus nationalist, one.
33 Unlike the rest of the film’s score, which is library music, this cue, which is diegetic and contains uniquely South African content, may have been recorded for the film. The credits do not elaborate on this point, however. 34 For a recording of the national anthem of the Orange Free State, see DeroVolk (2014). 170
Pathos and kitsch Typically, the war films under discussion here offer three standard types of scoring: action, espionage and romance/pathos. The action tends to be neutral: frequently it involves battle, and the music aims to be exciting and energetic while not specifically following the fortunes of either side. Likewise, the espionage music primarily aims to create tension while Boer soldiers engage in sabotage or infiltration work, without particularly aligning itself to one side or the other. The romance and pathos cues, in contrast, are quite clear in their allegiance. They sentimentalize the actions of the Boer soldiers, and enhance the pathos of the various love scenes, establishing the Boers as warm, passionate and romantically attractive, in contrast to the English, who are cold, uptight and motivated by social constraint rather than natural feeling. Syrupy romantic strings accompanying the Boer forces signify them as not just legendary fighters, but personifications of Afrikaner nationalist emotion, fighting for freedom against a force with the numbers, firepower and bureaucracy to overwhelm them.
Die Kavaliers begins its musical treatment with this trope. Following an opening battle scene (which, bizarrely, is culled from footage appearing in the narrative at later points in the film), protagonist and Kavaliers leader, Chris Botha, conveys a wounded soldier from the battlefield on horseback [0:01:02]. The shot is brief, but through soaring strings and chromatic-Romantic melodic writing the music establishes the pathos of the gallant Botha risking his life to save his comrade. Likewise, Kruger Miljoene capitalizes on the pathos of Boer families losing loved ones to the war, as a former Kavalier’s sister learns from Chris Botha of her brother’s death [0:07:55]. A simple diatonic melody on piano with arpeggiated left hand accompanied by sustained strings and horns, providing an atmosphere of pathos bordering on kitsch, accompanies the scene.
One of the most explicit examples of kitsch as a nationalist statement is Gé Korsten’s Kruger Miljoene performance of “My Hart Verlang na die Boland” [my heart longs for the Boland35], with music by Olaf Andresen and lyrics by Cassie le Grange [0:17:31]. Various
35 The Boland is an area of the current Western Cape Province, known for its wine production. At the time of the South African Wars, it was part of the Cape Colony. Gé Korsten’s character is singing this particular song as he is a Cape rebel from the Boland. The Cape rebels were citizens 171 elements function together to contribute to this reading. The lyrics establish the Romantic nostalgic yearning for a particular locale, bringing the forces of nationalism to bear on a particular part of the country; and for a “nooientjie” [sweetheart] who resides in this area. The musical style evokes an atmosphere of dreamy nostalgia through its reverb-drenched strings. It owes much to a Bavarian, oompah-influenced idiom of German folk music. The visuals offer a montage of mountain scenery, from mountain-top level and from aerial view. The entire effect is of a kitschy European utopia—rolling alpine hills accompanied by nostalgic lyrics and dreamy, saccharine strings. In the context of apartheid South Africa, the entire package demonstrates song as a tool of land appropriation. The deeply Germanic influence of the musical style interacts with the mountain scenery in a stylistically similar manner to popular portrayals of the Alps. These rely on a combination of aerial and ground-based images with nostalgic folk-influenced or melodramatically grandiose music, producing a state of kitsch close to that brought to bear on South African scenery in Kruger Miljoene.36 The result is appropriation through cultural association, completed by the film’s blanket writing out of existence of black South Africans. The whole is a tool of nationalism through the sentimentalization of land issues—by emoting about the land, the film attempts to stake its claim to ownership of that land by white South Africans. This strategy is similar to the pastoral-nationalist strategy of Simon Beyers discussed above, and to that of Geboortegrond discussed below. The kitsch sentimentality of lyrics, music and mountain scenery functions as a clear statement of nationalism. The composer’s past membership of the Ossewabrandwag37 encourages this reading (see Domus 2014). The kinds of strategies this scene implements recur in a number of other films, the nationalist strategies of which can be categorized as a form of “utopian nationalism”. As already
of the Cape Colony who rebelled against the Colony’s leadership during the 2nd South African War, allying themselves with the Boer republics (Shearing 2004: iii). 36 See for example emiratesperfumes (2011) and andrew67ist (2013). Although both these examples are significantly later than the production date of Kruger Miljoene, all three, I would argue, tap into the same spirit of kitsch regarding representation of Alpine scenery and culture, or pseudo-Alpine scenery in the case of Kruger Miljoene. 37 The Ossewabrandwag [ox-wagon sentinal] was a paramilitary, pro-Nazi mass movement organized around resistance to participation in the 2nd World War on the Allied side, campaigning for “a free Afrikaner republic based on Nationalist-Socialist foundations”, and actively engaging in sabotage and assassinations in support of their anti-war policies (Giliomee and Mbenga 2008: 300). 172 mentioned, space precludes detailed discussion of this category in the current study, though Debbie, discussed below, provides some analysis of its characteristics.
Bourgeois nationalism: social intrigue Complementing those films that establish their nationalist metanarrative through epic or mythologized history, other films present their political affiliation as the metanarrative to urban middle class life in contemporaneous society. Tension between prevailing social norms and the transgressive actions of a protagonist in relation to those norms drive these films. This is the case in such films as Geboortegrond (1946 dir. Pierre de Wet), Pinkie se Erfenis (1946 dir. Pierre de Wet), Hans die Skipper (1953 dir. Bladon Peake), Geheim van Onderplaas (1962 dir. Al Debbo), Debbie (1965) and Geheim van Nantes (1969 dir. Dirk de Villiers). Insofar as these films typically offer redemption for their transgressive protagonist, they are progressive within their context in recognizing the need for mutability of their own conservative value system. They never undermine the value system to the point of collapse, however; instead, they reach some compromise between transgressor and society, the transgressor undergoing some form of punishment in exchange for social readmission. The underlying legitimacy of the value system therefore remains unquestioned and intact.
Geboortegrond (1946) Simon Beyers covers five years in a family of Dutch settlers/Afrikaans ancestors during the early colonization of the Cape. Geboortegrond follows a comparable approach, focussing its attention on the dynamics of one Afrikaans farming family, but at the other end of the colonial spectrum, the dawn of apartheid. Pierre de Wet, who directed these films a year apart, addresses in each the same theme displaced in time: the dynamics of the Afrikaner family regarding patriarchy, and the relationship of family to land. Patriarchy and land are fundamental aspects of the Afrikaner nationalist viewpoint. Both Simon Beyers and Building a Nation strongly affirm the relationship between taming the land and the fortunes of the Afrikaner people (see Chapter 3), and Simon Beyers as patriarch exercises control over the community established around his farm, from his slaves to his brother. 173
These two issues drive Geboortegrond’s narrative.38 The patriarchy theme is expressed through the Afrikaner family unit, especially the familial stress caused through the tyranny of an emotionally crippled father figure. The land theme explores rural/urban tension experienced by Afrikaner families in the early part of the 20th century. Moedertjie first addressed this latter theme fifteen years earlier, though Geboortegrond approaches the issue as a question of lifestyle choice and acceptance or rejection of heritage, as opposed to financial necessity.
Max Bruce’s score for Geboortegrond is unusual, being scored entirely for organ,39 though as discussed in Chapter 2, this seems to have been a common scoring for South African documentaries at least in the early 1930s.40 Geboortegrond‘s very use of a composer, instead of library music, is itself unusual for this period. This is especially so since Simon Beyers, by an almost identical production team and produced a year after Geboortegrond, does not. In an environment with limited budget, library music offers access to dramatic scoring not otherwise available—in the case of Simon Beyers, it provides the film with a faux epic sweep it would otherwise entirely lack, as is the case with Geboortegrond, the composed score for which remains understated throughout.
The title theme is the German folk song “O Tannenbaum” [Oh Christmas Tree], scored, like all the non-library music cues,41 for organ. Although commonly associated with Christmas, the melody and lyrics were not originally so associated: Ernst Anschütz’s 1824 lyrics are a Christianized version of a German folk song, and according to Garden (2002) the melody is a popular 19th century song borrowed from a traditional students’ song. The song praises the evergreen nature of the fir tree. Its relevance to Geboortegrond is the evergreen nature of the tree as metaphor for Jan’s underlying, consistent nature: he attempts
38 A plot summary of Geboortegrond is available at M-Net Corporate (2015). 39 A Max Bruce opened the Wurlitzer organ at the Alhambra Theatre in Cape Town in 1929 (KenRoe 2012), and was also the first organist at the Blackpool Tower Ballroom in 1929 (Rhondda Cynon Taff Library Service 2011; Watford 2012). These could plausibly all be the same person, though I have not established this with certainty. 40 See page 74. 41 Library cues accompany the city space. A Dixie jazz cue introduces the city, establishing its frenetic liveliness in contrast to the stolid, weighty, rural-centred organ theme. Later, a Mendelssohnian scherzando cue creates an impression of machine-like movement and industry as Jan learns his trade as an agricultural machinery sales representative. 174 to change his fundamental self, exchanging farming for city life, but as his wife frequently reminds him, he belongs on his parents’ farm. He eventually admits, “Ek het dit nog altyd geweet” [I always knew it]. The theme develops associations with Jan’s family farm—in particular, with the soil itself, with Jan’s father Koos, and with the family home. Thus the title cue, or central musical theme, is directly concerned with the themes of land (the soil) and patriarchy (Jan’s father).
The title cue combines pre-existing and new meanings, from its associated lyrics regarding the evergreen nature of the fir tree, and the meaning acquired from its narrative association, representing the earthy traditionalism of conservative, patriarchal Afrikanerdom. Consolidating these meanings arrives at an expression of the constancy of patriarchal values and of the eternal importance of the land in Afrikaner culture. The final scene, accompanied by this cue, affects a reconciliation between the two opposing forces responsible for the narrative tension, namely the modern, urban aspirations of Jan versus the traditionalist, rural outlook of his father. Jan’s own nature compels him to return to the farm, while Koos meeting his grandson compels him to accept Jan back—the patriarchal system cannot function profitably without continuation of the male line. While the title cue represents, for most of the film, everything Jan is aspiring to escape from, in the end he is subsumed into its representation, taking his natural place, after his urban sojourn, on the farm.42
“O Tannenbaum” occurs four times in the course of the film, at structurally important positions—the very beginning, the very end, Jan’s departure from the farm, and his wife Betty’s arrival at the farm to begin a reconciliation. I analyse each of these occurrences in turn to explore the evolving relationship between the film’s music and its central themes of land and patriarchy.
The theme first plays during the opening credits, extending into the first scene of Jan ploughing the earth on his parents’ farm. Close-up shots of the earth being ploughed
42 There is another similarity here between Afrikaner and African urbanization film narratives: both present the notion (fictional in the case of the latter, debatable in the case of the former) that urbanization is a temporary state of affairs, allowing young men to gain work/life experience and earn some money before returning to the rural environment to which they “belong”. 175 alternate with mid-range shots of the team of oxen pulling the ancient plough and Jan’s father walking across the field. “O Tannenbaum” is thus immediately associated with the earth; with tradition, through the manual ox-powered plough; and with Jan’s father, who establishes his stern paternalist credentials from the outset. It is also associated with Jan, who is doing the ploughing: at this stage, he is still a part of his father’s traditional, patriarchal world, prior to his rebellion. Also part of the shot and thus of this world is the black labourer controlling the team of oxen, harking back to the ploughing scene at the end of Building a Nation, discussed in Chapter 2, which Maingard (2007: 54) interprets as an allegory of Afrikaner nationalist society.43 While that instance is allegorical and metonymic—the ploughed land and the ploughers themselves representing South Africa as a land tamed, the fields tilled and the old enemy put to constructive work—the scene in Geboortegrond is personal, an intimate look at the family unit as one of the building blocks of nationalism.
The melody appears for the second time as Jan prepares to leave for the city, after arguing with his father [0:17:32]. The cue begins as Jan says goodbye to his father, who ignores him. The previous occurrence of the title cue, following the opening credits, focussed predominantly on the soil, and the ploughing thereof. Now Koos himself is the subject of the theme, represented by the theme’s conceptual framework, while simultaneously, through being represented by it, expanding its framework of representation. The conceptual framework of the theme thus now stands at land, tradition and patriarchy.
The third occurrence of the melody accompanies Jan’s wife Betty arriving at the farm to look after Jan’s mother [0:35:48]. The conceptual associations established between music and narrative are maintained through the reappearance of the title cue at this physical return of an extension of Jan to his parent’s farm. The ineffectual implementation of this cue speaks to the film-musical inexperience of both composer and industry alike. The theme is squashed together with an inconsequential motif, shown in Example 10, as Betty tries a number of doors searching for the entrance to Jan’s mother’s room.
43 See page 75. 176
Example 10: "Door-opening" motif from Geboortegrond [0:36:02]
“O Tannenbaum” would have achieved greater impact half-a-minute earlier in the narrative, accompanying the establishing shot of Koos and Betty approaching the farm by horse-drawn cart; instead this takes place in silence. Since the scene is being set visually, there is space for the music to do likewise, to more firmly establish the link between musical theme and location.
The title cue’s final occurrence [1:02:49] cements the nationalist concepts fundamental to the narrative, which this cue has been integral in conveying. The final scene shows a view over the fields from the farm’s door, framed on either side by Jan and Betty’s silhouettes, while Koos walks away towards the fields, his grandson on his shoulders [1:03:11]. A number of elements of Afrikaner nationalism—land, the family unit, patriarchy and the ancestral male line—are included in the shot, as the title cue surges to a climax point. Perhaps the title cue aims to convey this societal model of patriarchal agrarianism as an eternal, “evergreen” solution. At the time of the film’s production, two years prior to the National Party’s rise to power and the formalization of apartheid proper, perhaps the implementation of such a model seemed a distinct possibility.
Pinkie se Erfenis (1946) Pinkie se Erfenis44 [Pinkie’s inheritance] uses music very sparingly. Orchestral library cues occur near the beginning and during the final sequence; there are only three other
44 As with many earlier South African film productions, Pinkie se Erfenis is also based on a play, in this case Pierre de Wet’s Pinkie (1942-3) (Hauptfleisch 2012). The plot of the film deals with a mentally and physically disabled boy, Pinkie, who befriends Naomi, a blind girl. He has access to some money that is intended to pay for an operation to fix his physical disability. Instead, despite his ill treatment by Naomi’s guardian Oom Piet, he donates the money to Naomi so she can regain her sight. Embarrassed by his own physical appearance, the film ends with Pinkie departing before Naomi gains the ability to see him. 177 instrumental extra-diegetic cues. Two of these last no more than a few seconds and are functionally ambiguous, in that they do not appear to further any of the narrative or expressive goals of the film. The only extended cue during the picture is the orchestral accompaniment to the aftermath of Naomi’s operation, creating suspense through the gradual removal of her eye bandages as we wait to see if the operation has cured her blindness.
Pinkie provides most of the music himself on a mouth organ. The instrument’s sound becomes a motif for Pinkie, unusual in being supplied diegetically by the character it represents. This approach predates a similar iconic use in Once Upon a Time in the West (1968 dir. Sergio Leone): the character Harmonica plays a slow, eerie melody on his mouth organ. The sounds of their playing represent but also characterize both Pinkie and Harmonica—in Harmonica’s case, mysterious, enigmatic and portentous; in Pinkie’s case, cheery and positive despite hardship. Harmonica’s motif functionally extends beyond characterization, however: its association with Harmonica is the seed the plot grows from. Pinkie’s association with the harmonica, by contrast, is much looser. He has no motif, in the sense of a recurring theme. Typically, he blows a few random notes upon entering a scene. The physical object of the harmonica, however, as an extension of Pinkie, contains emotional resonance. Oom Piet smashes it underfoot, an act of violence against Pinkie himself, and Naomi later replaces it, making Pinkie whole once more. But the film does not capitalize on the opportunity to musically provide emotional resonance through the harmonica. Pinkie never plays the instrument for an extended period until the final scene, and thus no musical association for Pinkie, or between Pinkie and Naomi for instance, develops. The harmonica remains a largely disposable, unintegrated symbol of Pinkie.
The characterization of Oom Piet and his violence against Pinkie, when analysed in conjunction with the relationship between Jan and Koos in Geboortegrond, provides evidence of director Pierre de Wet’s ambivalent relationship to patriarchy. Both Koos and Oom Piet are gratuitously violent—in the case of Koos, towards his own son, and in the case of Oom Piet, towards a cripple.45 Oom Piet smashing Pinkie’s harmonica is a classic
45 The same actors play both these pairs of characters—Jan Brill as Koos and Oom Piet, Pierre de Wet as Jan and Pinkie. 178 act of nationalist territory staking: Pinkie is crippled, a weakness not permitted in the nationalist patriarchal model of strong male figures; as Taruskin (no date) points out, “self- definition is practically always accompanied, indeed made possible, by other-definition”. Pinkie’s attentions towards Naomi are particularly unwelcome in Oom Piet’s eyes. He therefore physically destroys a part of Pinkie’s character, not just on one narrative level but on two: within the diegesis, Pinkie loses his harmonica, an integral part of his self- expression; the violence of nationalism thus breaks through the frame of the diegetic reality into extra-diegetic reality, and is responsible for silencing Pinkie’s motif, destroying his character’s musical expression. Simultaneously, however, de Wet supports the nationalist framework within which Koos and Oom Piet inflict violence on those within their ambit of patriarchal control. Jan is reconciled into Koos’s world, which remains intact other than the defusing of Koos’s intractable stubbornness; and Oom Piet is permitted to maintain his ambit of control, from which Pinkie exiles himself, despite the emotional repercussions he will suffer.
In the final scene, Pinkie eventually plays Lowell Mason’s setting of “Nearer My God to Thee”. This tune already had filmic associations: it was used in the 1936 San Francisco (dir. W.S. van Dyke) and again in the 1943 Titanic [1:24:18] (dir. Herbert Selpin),46 in both these contexts it is used to emphasize a moment of peaceful respite in the context of disaster, as well as a sense of resignation and acceptance of one’s ultimate fate. The song’s lyrics approach death euphemistically. Pinkie plays it as he exits alone into the forest, having been responsible for Naomi’s full recovery but not wishing her to see him now she has recovered her sight. From Pinkie’s perspective, the lyrics suggest he thereby suffers a metaphorical “death”, through his double sacrifice for Naomi—firstly, the donation of his money, earmarked to fix his crippled limbs, to Naomi, and secondly, his choice of isolation from Naomi. From Naomi’s point of view, they suggest the angelic nature of Pinkie and his selfless act.
46 A German production from the 2nd World War, it is unlikely the film would have been accessible in South Africa before 1946 when Pinkie was released, given Germany and South Africa’s positions on opposing sides. Selpin, the director, was jailed and killed mid-way through the production on the orders of Josef Goebbels for supposedly treasonous comments made to the film’s fanatical Nazi screenwriter (Hawkins 2012). 179
There let the way appear, steps unto heav'n; All that Thou sendest me, in mercy giv'n; Angels to beckon me nearer, my God, to Thee. (NetHymnal 2013)
The destructive tensions between Pinkie and paternalistic nationalism are signified musically. His musical characterization is silenced, and the result of his self-imposed exile, instigated through the shame instilled in him due to his nonconformity, is implied musically as an at best metaphorical, at worst actual, passing. While other musical representations of nationalism in this chapter are all positive affirmations of the concept, only Pinkie’s harmonica playing offers a musical critique of nationalism.
Despite this rare negative critique of Afrikaner nationalism, the film itself fails to free itself from the constraints of a nationalist viewpoint. It wields physical disability, which afflicts both Pinkie and Naomi, as a tool for solipsistic sentimentalization of the Afrikaner middle class. Despite the real suffering caused by white South Africa’s policies and lifestyle (at the time of this film, led by United Party Prime Minister Jan Smuts), suffering of individual, vulnerable members of the white bourgeoisie is instead fabricated to promote the significance of white lives. This supports the Afrikaner nationalist axiom that white suffering is more important and somehow more intense than black suffering. The performance of “Nearer My God to Thee” intensifies and contextualizes this sentimentalization in religious terms, transforming Pinkie from unfortunate cripple into pure, saintly figure.
Debbie (1965) Debbie47 is the most explicitly nationalist of the films in the “bourgeois” category, through its moralization about the repercussions of extra-marital sex and pregnancy. While it does not explicitly cast judgement on Debbie, portraying her sympathetically, its focus on the emotional angst through which Debbie must pass, including the permanent loss of her child through adoption, serves as fair warning to those who would stray from the orthodoxies of the time regarding pregnancy and marriage. It is therefore ironic, given its very conservative nature, that the film was initially threatened with banning due to its risqué
47 A plot summary of Debbie is available at M-Net Corporate (2015). 180 subject matter, and was released with a 21 years-and-older age restriction (Botha 2012: 52). What then seemed transgressive and progressive now serves as evidence of the extent of the internalization of apartheid ideology even by the relatively forward-thinking makers of this film.
Much of Debbie’s score, created by Chris Lamprecht and Manley van Niekerk,48 relies on material from a song Debbie performs over the opening credits. Debbie performs an Afrikaans version of the tune best known in relation to its Thomas Moore setting “Believe me if all those endearing young charms”. Song and film share the theme of youthful charm and innocence giving way to the trials of adulthood. Debbie is an adaptation of Tryna du Toit’s novel Groen Koring: the novel’s title likewise captures the concept of youthful inexperience, soon to be disrupted by the enforced adulthood necessitated by teenage pregnancy.
I read the music’s central purpose as affirmation and dramatization of the protagonists’ bourgeois existence. Broadly, the score parses affirmation and dramatization according to the respective themes of leisure and social transgression. The leisure theme presents a depiction of the wholesome lives of wealthy Afrikaner young adults as they embark on their university careers, and later, in the activities of this generation upon reaching the age of employment—horse riding, swimming, sports-car racing, and private plane ownership. This representation of white South Africans’ wholesome, luxurious lifestyle starts emerging in earlier films like Oupa en die Plaasnooientjie and Tom, Dirk en Herrie. The score is important in affirming this lifestyle as a positive phenomenon. The social transgression theme, in contrast, is concerned with the troubles initiated by Debbie’s accidental pregnancy—musical expression of this is partially achieved by the main theme’s modification from major to parallel minor, with additional changes including an earnest, Romantic ♭II-I harmonic progression as a cadence at the end of the passage.
48 Chris Lamprecht appears to still be active in the Afrikaans choral music environment. Manley van Niekerk ran Manley van Niekerk Studios; see for instance Electric Jive (2009), which documents a 1962 project recorded there including members of the Blue Notes and Stanley Glasser. 181
These two concepts, affirmation and dramatization, promote the bourgeois nationalist agenda in their own manner. Regarding the first theme, the nationalist agenda is apparent in the endorsement of white economic superiority demonstrated through leisure time, expressed musically through carefree contemporary popular styles and diegetic volksliedjies [folk songs], such as “Bobbejaan klim die berg” [baboon climbs the mountain]. This song, although used here in a manner conducive to nationalist interpretation, appears in the satirical Jannie Totsiens (1970, dir. Jans Rautenbach) in a very different manner: Tony en Jan’s excellent guitar and vocal duet arrangement accompanies the mentally ill ex-Ossewabrandwag member Koos Liebenberg enacting his nocturnal militaristic fantasies while running around in the bush. The implication is clearly that the right-winger is himself baboon-like, which, in line with the common reading of Jannie Totsiens as allegory for South Africa, applies to all extreme right-wingers.
As with Gé Korsten’s rendition of “My hart verlang na die Boland” in Kruger Miljoene, Debbie implicates the landscape and environment, with the integral support of the score, in the Afrikaner nationalist agenda: wilderness areas49 function as playgrounds for the wealthy white elite to speedboat through against a background of indigenous wildlife. This implies a sense of ownership of the land by white South Africans. The music supports this through a jolly 6/8 Classical-pastoral-style reworking of the main theme, “Believe me if all those endearing young charms”,50 heard as Debbie and Paul frolic on the beach, transcribed in Example 11. This musical strategy of drawing on the pastoral trope assists in establishing the white protagonists as partaking in an untroubled bucolic idyll.51 The use of this theme also effectively foreshadows the events to come, issuing a subtle warning that the “endearing young charms” of the youthful couple at play on the beach are destined “to change by tomorrow… Like fairy gifts fading away” (Moore 1808).
49 In this case, part of the Greater St Lucia Wetland Park, now known as the iSimangaliso Wetland Park, in northern Kwazulu-Natal. 50 Much of the score is constructed motivically around this theme, which is recontextualized both within a Classical/Romantic framework and through light jazz scoring. 51 See the discussion of The Jackals in Chapter 3, page 114, for contextualization of the use of the pastoral trope in South African film, and the discussion in relation to Simon Beyers, page 153. 182
Example 11: Beach scene from Debbie [0:13:00] 183
Example 11 continued
In the context of the second theme, following the start of Debbie’s problems, the music promotes the film’s agenda through inflating its seriousness of purpose, principally through borrowing of tropes of earnest Romanticism. These are the harmonic progression, as already mentioned, and the instrumentation, specifically the quasi-virtuoso piano arpeggios that accompany the melodic line played by the winds [first heard at 0:0:24]. These arpeggios demand that the music and what it accompanies are accorded the respect and mystique that bourgeois classical music appreciation awards to the Romantic-concerto- playing concert pianist. A bourgeois musical language thus caters for the bourgeois domain of the film. This language is indeed (one of) the musical language(s) of Afrikaner nationalism itself, as established through the types of cultural activity promoted by the provincial arts boards,52 which largely focussed on historical classical European works.53
52 See footnote 55 in Chapter 4 for further information about the arts boards. 53 Martin (2013: 141) explains that
[f]or a long time, white Cape Town, and South Africa as a whole, considered that genuine culture could only emanate from Europe, and that South African culture could only derive from a transposition of European, and to a lesser degree North American, creations. 184
Geheim van Nantes (1969) Debbie represents a typical approach to the scoring of its genre, drawing upon a number of conventions associated with Romanticism, including instrumentation, approach to texture, harmonic conventions etc., to score the melodrama of the social scandal and the emotional turmoil surrounding it. Geheim van Nantes’s plot is almost as conventional—the geheim [secret] of the title is also concerned with childbirth out of wedlock, or suspicion thereof.54 A percentage of the score55 plays to this conventionality—principally, the title theme and the numerous short cues based on it throughout the film.56 The theme itself is the song “Keer op Keer” [time and again] sung by Leonore Veenemans.57 In this sense, its formal approach to the score’s design is very similar to Debbie’s, also based on a song heard during the opening credits. The approach is also similar to Pinkie se Erfenis and Geboortegrond, which make use of well-known pre-existing tunes. Geheim van Nantes’s more conventional aspect, however, is counterbalanced by other aspects of the score, including some very novel approaches to scoring not normally associated with family melodrama.58 I thus include Geheim van Nantes here as a counterbalance to Debbie: its unconventionality at times borders on early postmodernity in its genre-crossing instrumentations and mix of idioms, including jazz, Modernist concert music, light
54 Forbidden, broken or lack of marriage, and the paternity of subsequent children, is a popular topic in this genre; Die Geheim van Onderplaas, for instance, is based on a similar theme. It is not included as part of this discussion for space reasons, and because it makes use of library music in a conventional dramatic orchestral idiom. 55 This film presents some difficulties in determining the use of library music versus specifically composed score. Con Lamprecht is credited as musical director, rather than composer. I have established the presence of at least one library music cue, shown in Example 12. The title song and soundtrack were, as stipulated in the opening credits, for sale separately. This suggests that the bulk of the musical cues were composed for the film. In addition, a number of cues throughout the film are based on the title song, and thus must have been written specifically for the film. 56 The plot of Geheim van Nantes sees Jacques le Roux arriving unbidden on the wine farm Nantes looking for work. The farm’s owner, Armand du Mont, turns out, coincidentally, to be Jacques mother Sonja’s ex-husband. Jacques falls in love with Sandra du Toit, who is to be engaged to Pierre du Mont, the unpleasant and idle heir to Nantes. After much plotting by Pierre with Julia, Sandra’s mother, who wishes to marry her daughter to Pierre and receive her own slice of Nantes, it transpires that Armand is Jacques’ father, making Jacques the son and heir Armand has always lacked. Armand and Sonja reconcile, and Sandra abandons Pierre for Jacques. 57 Veenemans was a well-known South African opera soprano and singer of light music. See Leonore Veenemans (2010). 58 It appears that the only previous discussion of the music in this film is a short comment by Moses (date unknown1), who mentions the “wholly intrusive music cues”. 185 orchestral and musique concrète. Unusually for the era and the film’s cultural environment, it also musically acknowledges the coloured farm workers on the extra-diegetic soundtrack through goema music. The innovative music works together with Koos Roets’s innovative camera work to elevate the film’s conventional elements, providing layers of meaning beyond the melodramatic narrative framework.
In contrast to Debbie, Geheim van Nantes seems musically to take itself less seriously—it includes earnest pathos, but also undermines generic norms by constantly drawing attention to itself through incongruous cues and unusual instrumentation. One could argue, however, that this approach furthers the nationalist agenda. While Debbie offers an earnest, heart- on-sleeve approach that is dated and expressively primitive, Geheim van Nantes offers a more intriguing approach that more effectively paints the protagonists as players in a legitimate and cosmopolitan society, despite their saturation in the conventions and social structure of Afrikaner nationalism,. This is despite the obvious disparities on display. These include payment of wine-farm workers by means of the tot system [0:13:00], contrasted with the white wanderer who comes to work as a labourer on the farm and is instantly granted access to the family supper table [0:15:08]. Workers of colour on the farm naturally have no opportunity to take part in this accelerated hierarchical progression. The coloured worker with a speaking role in the film serves as comic relief, and as in earlier films, such as Simon Beyers, his only apparent interest is in the well-being and social activities of his employers [0:42:08].
The films covered in this section on bourgeois nationalism display, as discussed, an explicit concern with issues of patriarchy. Geboortegrond and Pinkie se Erfenis focus on patriarchs obsessed with the enforcing of their will on others, while Debbie shows two different types of patriarchy—the urbane but ambitious father figure and the conservative, rigid one. Geheim van Nantes also demonstrates two kinds of patriarchy—again, one rigid but at least able to learn from his mistakes, and one kind but also a slightly comic figure, good at his work but socially unambitious and ineffectual. These two types of patriarchy characterize Geheim van Nantes’s two dominant musical trends. Armand du Mont, the owner of the wine farm Nantes, is associated with the “serious” scoring in lyrical Romantic style of the title cue, which also characterizes his relationship to Sonja le Roux. 186
Example 12: Giepie Wessels’s cue from Geheim van Nantes [first heard at 0:07:36]59
59 Regarding this cue’s key, either the musicians tuned to an idiosyncratic A (perhaps necessary because of the construction of the marimba), or more likely the film’s playback speed has 187
Example 12 continued
In contrast, Giepie Wessels, the farm’s foreman, receives a whimsical cue constructed from short, repetitive ostinato figures, transcribed in Example 12.60 This demonstrates a willingness to critique patriarchal or matriarchal figures, portraying them in an absurd or light-hearted manner, unlike many other films, where they are treated with seriousness of tone, even if the film itself seems to consider their opinions suspect.61 An exception is
undergone some change. The actual tonal centre is somewhere between C♯ and C, slightly closer to the former. 60 I believed this cue to be original to the film before happening to encounter an instance of it in the documentary What the Future Sounded Like (2007 dir. Matthew Bate). 61 Debbie is a good example: the meeting of Paul and Debbie’s parents establishes that a theme of the film is Afrikaner class difference, as a function of approaches to patriarchy—conservative rural versus cosmopolitan urban. Debbie’s conservative father advocates punishment and hardship, 188 slapstick comedic films, where figures such as Al Debbo and Jamie Uys establish themselves, rather than others, as figures of fun. Geheim van Nantes’s depiction of the comic side of a patriarchal figure like Giepie is unusual.
The score awards similar treatment to the ambitious social climber Julia du Toit: frenetic bongos accompany her frantic bustling to intercept her daughter’s conversation with Jacques le Roux, as she has earmarked Pierre du Mont, heir to Nantes, as her daughter’s fiancée. The camera participates in this characterization, following closely behind her at hip level to capture the bustling action of her movement [0:23:53]. The score uses other unusual combinations of instruments to characterize Julia’s extravagant social airs. The signpost at the gate to her farm affectedly spells her surname to enhance its French origin and pronunciation, “Du Twa”, instead of the standard, Afrikaans pronunciation of “Do Toy”. Cutting to her bedroom, she applies over-the-top make-up, including a beauty spot. The score accompanies this introductory characterization with a strong boeremusiek influence, including instrumentation of concertina and guitar, but with the unlikely addition of harp, playing elaborate glissando sweeps between phrases. The instrumentation is thus analogous to Julia’s own character—earthy origins62 overlaid with a veneer of sophistication, much as the harp, predominantly a classical orchestral instrument, stands in relation to the more common folk instruments of the guitar and concertina.
Armand du Mont’s image of stern patriarchal control comes unstuck as circumstances force him to face the decisions that have resulted in his twenty-five year isolation. A musique concrète cue of heavily delayed drums, repetitive vocal phrases and layers of speech fragments with a fast delay accompanies his breakdown [1:27:21]. The exploration of the psychology of a patriarchal figure, even if in rather limited terms, is once again novel; the contrast is stark compared with Oom Piet’s treatment in Pinkie se Erfenis, who is taken while Paul’s cosmopolitan father advocates effective problem solving. Although the film establishes a preference for the latter, it nevertheless treats the former as a respectable authority figure. Another example is Pierre de Wet’s ambivalent relationship to patriarchy, discussed on page 171. 62 South Africa’s surnames with French origins come from the Huguenot families who first arrived in the Cape Colony in 1688, predominantly to engage in farming, and continued to arrive in significant numbers. According to Giliomee and Mbenga (2008: 46), “[f]rom the mid-1680s to 1729 a total of 289 Huguenots arrived”, who “formed almost a fifth of the total European population”. 189 entirely at face value. The move from typical Romantic scoring into the realm of musique concrète accesses a new vista of emotional expression, enabling exploration of the psychological underpinnings of the character, in contrast to interpreting the character according to the limited Romantic palette available for the study of personal motivation.
While Geheim van Nantes works within and is part of a very conservative political framework, it succeeds, through its cross-genre musical approach and unconventional instrumental combinations, in presenting an image of bourgeois nationalism more compelling than the likes of Debbie, with its over-earnestness and apparent inability to observe itself contextually. The film demonstrates how conservativism can benefit from progressivism. Perhaps an analogous alliance is that of Christianity and rock: the religion’s proponents aim for ideological traction amongst their target market through packaging ideology in a cultural medium conducive to that market.
Concluding remarks Nationalism in music has never relied on a static set of techniques: its expression is dependent on time, place and attitude.63 The film-musical representation of Afrikaner nationalism results from an array of techniques from various sources, most of which achieve such representation through filmic context rather than prior association with nationalist ideology. Thus, particular stylistic tropes and even particular pieces of music lacking prior nationalist associations can take on such associations through recontextualization.
Land, patriarchy, religion, mythologized history, patriotism, desire for independence, and solidarity against British incursion are some of the central nationalist motifs expressed in the films covered in this chapter. The last category includes subcategories such as military pride, fraternal unity between patriotic fighters, logistical support and shelter by womenfolk, and pride in familiarity with indigenous terrain as a military asset rather than a hindrance. Independence and solidarity are explicit goals of nationalism, while patriarchy and the Calvinist religious ideology underpinning it are the metanarratives
63 See Taruskin (no date) for a detailed discussion of nationalism in European and later global concert music, for instance. 190 providing the direction and motivation for nationalism. Afrikaner nationalist mythology relies on the history of the interaction with land as the basis for a bourgeois, urban value system. This extends from the earliest days of Cape settlement, to the trek inland, to independent republics established through treaty and force with indigenous inhabitants and the British, to rural/urban tensions and the land’s changing function from agrarianism to industry, and finally to the consolidation of nationalist land rights through apartheid legislation.
The musical representation of these various motifs is achieved through harnessing a historically and geographically diverse assortment of musical resources, most of which in their original form exhibit “nationality” but not “nationalism”, to use Taruskin’s distinction (no date). Music as a tool of ideological land appropriation is a thread occurring in various guises through a number of films. Simon Beyers introduces the possibility of the pastoral trope in this regard, transferring European notions of land and land use onto the South African landscape. This use of the pastoral recurs in Debbie to achieve a similar end, where it contextualizes Afrikaner youth’s relationship to and utilization of the natural environment. Kruger Miljoene engages in a related strategy, both “Europeanizing” representations of South African scenery through treatment as Germanic, Alpine scenery, and sentimentalizing land and thus land issues, staking its claim to ownership through establishment of emotional connection to the land.
Sentimentalization and emoting is also Geboortegrond’s approach to the topic, attempting to define a deep and unbreakable bond between the Afrikaner volk and the soil itself. Its strategy for achieving this is musical, using a tune with associations of unchanging constancy, applied to the relationship between the volk and the tradition of working the land. This pride regarding understanding of, and having a deep bond with, the land as validation of Afrikaner nationalism, specifically involving land rights, is also evident in a military context, where Boer commandos pride themselves on intimate knowledge of the 191
South African environment enabling them to easily outwit the foreign, unacclimatized British soldiers.64
The British as adversaries give rise to much of the opportunity for nationalist expression, consistent with the Taruskin quote earlier, “self-definition is practically always accompanied, indeed made possible, by other-definition”. Stirring war themes rely on quasi-primitive techniques, such as bare fifths and horn calls, expressing the idea of straightforward, uncomplicated, resolute bravery. Patriotism inspires this bravery, in the form of the need to protect one’s own against the outsider. Musically, this is expressed through historical national anthems and stirring nationalist works, most notably Sibelius’s Finlandia, specifically referencing the quest for self-rule in the face of oppressive colonisers. It can also be expressed through heroic tropes from Hollywood—lone heroes, majestic internally but misunderstood externally: the pentatonic theme of the mythical protagonist of Die Ruiter in die Nag, and his lone-horseman hilltop silhouette, reference “lonely cowboy” tropes.65
These representations of nationalism are predominantly historical. The set of values belonging to the urban Afrikaner bourgeoisie expresses contemporaneous nationalism. Such values rely heavily on patriarchy and on adherence to a moral code to avoid the possibility of skande [shame]. As expressions of nationalism, they are connotative, rather than denotative. Nationalism is the metanarrative dictating actions and attitudes, rather than an explicit goal of the characters, who are no longer striving for self-determination, or the achievement of a nationalist dream. Instead, they strive to prove themselves exemplary citizens in the society that arose because of that dream. Musically, then, the language itself is bourgeois: Debbie, for instance, offers stirring, melodramatic Romanticism, suave light jazz, a pretty, Schubertian flute and piano theme whose relevance to the narrative is not very clear, etc.
64 See for instance 1:09:20 of Paul Krüger, where a Boer soldier and a woman effortlessly hide themselves away from English soldiers on horseback, who are described as “heeltemaal vas aan die slaap” [completely fast asleep]. 65 See for instance Elvis Presley’s song “Lonesome Cowboy” from Loving You (1957 dir. Hal Kanter), the vocal line for which follows this pentatonic approach. To listen to this song, see oliounidizlove (2012). 192
Musical representation of Afrikaner nationalism in these films is multifaceted, relying on the repurposing of existing generic tropes in a South African context. Other types of representation are also used that require further research. One is the representation of nationalism through a utopian ideal based on a dream of apartheid wish-fulfilment. These films present a whites-only South Africa against a background of paradisiacal scenery, accompanied by music embodying the social ideals of apartheid morality—predominantly a kitsch, light orchestral/musical style appropriate to the filmic world, lacking in irony or self-reflectivity. Another, more interesting approach not covered here, and which may be unique to Daar Doer in die Bosveld (1951 dir. Jamie Uys), is boeremusiek as extra-diegetic underscore. Boeremusiek appears often in South African film, but usually as diegetic on- screen performance, rather than extra-diegetic accompaniment to on-screen action. Perhaps a link could be drawn between the use of folk music in 19th-century Romantic nationalist composition and the use of boeremusiek as a tool of nationalist expression in the context of South African film. 193 Conclusion
I begin this chapter by revisiting my research question. I motivate for its necessity in relation to building a meaningful interpretation of the primary source material, and in relation to gaps in the current literature that I aimed to address with my study. I then offer an answer to this question based on a synthesis of my findings from the preceding chapters. In answering the question, I attempt to construct an interpretive framework of a narrative of film-musical representation in relation to racial and cultural identity across my focal period. I then use these findings to address some theoretical implications for scholarly study of South African film music, and some policy implications for industry practitioners. Finally, I address the limitations of my study, and some implications and recommendations for further research.
Research question As stated in the Introduction, this study aimed to answer the following question:
What role has music played in South African film in relation to the representation of South African peoples and cultures, from the country’s first examples of sound film until the rapid expansion of the industry beginning around 1970?
Motivation The path I followed in developing the conceptual framework for this study, resulting in the above research question, provides insight into the motivation for the framework I eventually chose. Initially, I intended to explore the expression of a national musical identity in South African film, attempting to find a common stylistic thread running through the body of films that could be considered a national style, in the manner that one can talk about and compare such categories as Hollywood scoring style and British scoring style. As I developed familiarity with the films themselves, however, it became clear that no such style existed—just as South Africa defined itself post-1994 as “the rainbow nation”, purportedly united through its diversity, so South African film music is the rainbow nation of film scoring. This is not a coincidence—the country’s social 194 fragmentation is directly responsible for the stylistic fragmentation of film music. None of the individual disparate threads of film style, or film musical style, can lay claim to single- handedly representing national identity. A reductive model making a case for a single, dominant style is, in light of this fact, inappropriate and uninformative in the South African context.
I thus shifted the study’s focus towards a more inclusive model, attempting to explore how film musical style and genre had evolved over the course of the history of South African film. I intended to create a history of South African film music equivalent to histories of Hollywood film music, developing a model of stylistic development in relation to influences of technology, society and personality. This approach proved untenable for at least three reasons, however. These reasons, addressed below, are firstly lack of documentation, secondly lack of a teleological stylistic narrative, and thirdly inappropriateness to the context of South African society.
Firstly, the economic and artistic vibrancy of Hollywood ensured that not simply the films, but the industry itself, was closely observed and documented. Scholars of mainstream film music thus have access to a wealth of source material documenting the history of the industry and the studios, including public debate by creators and theorists of film music regarding matters of style, technique and ideology. Access to and discovery of this material may not have been straightforward, but it did at least exist. In the case of the South African film industry, it is not clear that such material does exist, especially in written form. Leon van Nierop’s documentary series Daar doer in die Fliek is probably the most comprehensive source available on industry practice, relying on interviews with past film industry practitioners. However, consistent with South African film scholarship, the role of music and of its composers remains unaddressed.
Secondly, there is a limited coherent stylistic trajectory over the course of South African film music history. As with the first point, this also results from the historical lack of a culture of debate regarding film music practice, as well as from the cultural fragmentation discussed above. Film composers have tended to work in isolation rather than in collaboration with or reaction to one another. The prevalence of library music emphasises 195 the extent to which South African filmmakers have marginalized music as an important aesthetic component.
Thirdly, in a South African context, an abstract discussion of genre and style lacks the necessary contextualization required to adequately account for the motivating factors governing film-musical practice. Race is implicitly or explicitly a subtext of the entire field of South African film. The refusal of most films to critically engage with race, and the legislated censorship in place under apartheid to prevent such engagement, despite (or rather because of) the issue’s complete pervasion of South African society, ensures that it is difficult to formulate a meaningful discussion of the industry without addressing this fundamental issue. Following scholarly approaches to Hollywood film music, which have tended to focus on theoretical concerns including dramatic function, narrative interaction and technique, is therefore not feasible. This does beg the question, however, though this is not the correct forum for addressing it, as to why such issues have not been a concern in mainstream film music scholarship, when Hollywood has itself consistently marginalized meaningful discussions of race.
For the above reasons, my decision to focus on musical representation of racial and cultural identity is necessary in order to formulate an understanding of film-musical practice. This is especially so given the study’s position as the first scholarly exploration of this body of work—it is necessary to understand the mechanics and ideology of the films’ techniques of racial representation before other interpretive strategies can be applied. Just as a knowledge of apartheid and pre-apartheid policy is fundamental to understanding South African society in the 20th century, so it is fundamental to understanding the cultural production that took place during those years.
My own ethnicity, as white, English-speaking South African, complicates this scholarly position, however. Firstly, it threatens to perpetuate colonial models of speaking on behalf of others. Secondly, though I would not describe the conceptual framework of this study as decolonial necessarily, it threatens to play a role in the colonization of decolonial scholarship from black voices to white voices. This is a trend in the current academic environment as white scholars adopt the discourse of decoloniality in order to stay relevant. The practical implications of this adoption can be the neutralization of decolonial discourse 196 through its adoption and reinterpretation by those who benefited from the injustices it seeks to redress, and a perpetuation of white dominance of academic posts through the hiring of these scholars who have made the discipline “safe” for established institutions and their practices. Nevertheless, as a South African citizen this history is also my own history, even if experienced from a historical position of privilege; and as discussed above, making sense of the impact of racial policy and bias on cultural production is an unavoidable part of the critical process of addressing cultural output.
Regarding the need to enact a study of South African film music in the first place, omissions in South African film scholarship, mainstream film music scholarship and national film music scholarship necessitated such a study. As noted in the literature review in Chapter 1, national identity has been central to recent South African film studies. Scholars such as Saks (2001 and 2010) have explicitly approached this subject through the framework of representation. Yet there is a failure to recognize the importance of music— a sizeable omission given its role not simply in representing established identities but in actually creating those identities. Regarding mainstream film music studies, a tendency exists towards promotion of a monoculture—such studies theorize about film music as if the only body of film available is the output of Hollywood, with occasional diversions into European film. Film music practitioners continue to conceptualize musical style in terms of binaries such as neutral vs “ethnic”, understood functionally as dramatic vs colouristic approaches to scoring. This monocultural approach has also meant that identity and representation are under-represented as conceptual frameworks. There has also been a tendency to assume music analysis is best enacted by critical theorists without formal musical training, resulting in wordy, inaccurate, arbitrarily selective analyses. Regarding national film music studies, these tend towards greater pluralism than mainstream studies—yet the music of African cinema remains largely unaddressed, with the exception of offerings such as Lachman’s (2013) article-length study of an individual French- Tunisian film, and a few isolated examples from South Africa. Film-musical representation of African peoples is thus a near non-existent area of scholarship. 197
Findings The narrative of representation In the process of synthesizing a narrative from the analysis of representation that constitutes the central theme of this study, I present the material here chronologically, rather than thematically, which is the principle of the chapter layout. In practice, this means that, following on from Chapter 2, I place the findings from Chapter 4 between those from the two halves of Chapter 3, and interlink the findings from Chapter 5 with the findings from these two chapters. The resulting narrative highlights the similarities, differences and tensions between the musical representations of black South Africans and Afrikaner nationalism.
Since the first Afrocentric film, African Jim, was only released in 1949, the early years of musical representation, both African and Afrikaner, occur in the context of British colonial and Afrikaner nationalist film. Narratives of modernity thus influence all forms of musical representation in these early films: ideologies of progress, civilizing, taming the land, mineral exploitation, genius entrepreneurs and backward natives dominate their discourse. Representations of black South Africans tend towards the tropes of Hollywood’s representation of Native Americans: when represented by the extra-diegetic orchestral underscore, the tendency is towards bare 5ths and simple, repetitive rhythms. Typically cast as the enemy, music used to represent them is with few exceptions war-oriented, and characterization takes place en masse as a fighting or dancing body. Standard tropes of exoticism play a role too, as in the “Egyptian” scoring of natives in King Solomon’s Mines, coupled with the natives’ supposed isolation from “civilization”. Scored diegetically, a tendency towards genericism persists, in which any African-sounding music is considered appropriate, irrespective of cultural provenance, as long as it fulfils the immediate political and narrative requirements of the scenario, as in King Solomon’s Mines, Rhodes of Africa and Simon Beyers.
The representation of Afrikaner nationalism in these early films progresses from Moedertjie’s narrative of despair, representing the Afrikaner people as victims, to the triumphal, nationalist epic Building a Nation in the space of a few years. A proportionate progression in technical and expressive scope of music accompanies this change, from 198 sentimental source music over the first and last minute of Moedertjie to a near through- composed score covering the gamut of nationalist-inspired emotion in Building a Nation. Yet Pierre de Wet’s ambivalent attitude towards nationalism complicates the issue. His narratives of Afrikaner family life, Geboortegrond and Pinkie se Erfenis, musically represent patriarchal nationalism as an inevitable, though somewhat backward and brutal, force. Neither film is able to break free of a nationalist interpretive framework, however, and the thematically similar Simon Beyers overcomes this ambivalence.
It is already clear from this narrative that musical representation is a political act, with, at this stage, an explicit colonial or nationalist agenda. Simon Beyers and Building a Nation in particular rewrite history to project contemporaneous demographics back in time, cementing 20th-century master/servant relationships as historically unchanging. Inevitably, Afrikaners are cast as subjects, while blacks are cast as objects, acted upon rather than acting. As I discuss below, music becomes a tool in both Afrikaans and African- oriented film for the politicization of land issues.
The release of African Jim marks an important development in the representation of black South Africans, from being represented, and thus othered, to the beginnings of self- representation. This is achieved through importation of the representational model of African Americans, both musically and structurally. Interestingly, such importation occurs in Afrikaner nationalist cinema as well, to represent urban spaces and characters in Geboortegrond, Tom, Dirk en Herrie and Die Tweede Slaapkamer, for instance. Like these films, Dilemma also uses jazz to represent whites and white spaces, but it acknowledges the irony. The nationalist films expect their audience to consume the music in a decontextualized manner, where jazz stands for nothing more than urban America, imported as a trope of cosmopolitanism. In the context of African Jim, the importation is aspirational and potentially covertly political, while in Dilemma the importation of Max Roach’s music is overtly political.
African Jim having set the trend, Africans in Afrocentric films become inseparable from associations with music, specifically diegetic performance. This is so in the mainstream assimilation of African talent in Zonk! and Song of Africa, and in the “alternative” productions The Magic Garden, Come Back, Africa and Dilemma. In contrast, Afrikaans 199 films completely avoid musical representation of black characters, whose appearance, predominantly as servants, is usually completely tacet. Come Back, Africa, meanwhile, adopts the same strategy, but in reverse—the petty, mean, white characters it features remain unaccompanied, while black characters receive rich, locally-flavoured accompaniment. Dilemma seeks the liberal middle ground, a buddy film in which the white and black protagonists, Toby and Steven, together take part in the consumption of, and are thus represented by, recorded and live jazz performance. Dilemma also marks the maturation of musical representation of black South African identity, from identity adoption in African Jim, to individualistic representation in Come Back, Africa, to music as creator of identity in Dilemma, through a focus on the creation processes of South African musicians. It promotes an interpretation of whites as passive consumers of music versus blacks as active creators of it.
Although African musical representation certainly evolves from African Jim to Dilemma, African music remains predominantly diegetic, lacking, with exceptions such as parts of Come Back, Africa, integration of black South African musical representation. While the same process occurs with diegetic performances of boeremusiek in Afrikaans film, this is always paired with extra-diegetic accompaniment of whites, initially through library music but increasingly through specifically composed orchestral scores. The white/black subject/object binary therefore remains in place.
During this period, as black South Africans are developing their own, new filmic identity through music, Afrikaans film is concerned with casting Afrikaner ancestors as Romantic, mythological heroes. A handful of films revisit the South African Wars, presenting their own patriotic call for the nationalist cause through the resurrection of extinct national anthems and tapping into musical tropes of resolute, warrior-like heroism. Simultaneously, a stream of melodramatic bourgeois content is accompanied by appropriately bourgeois music, stylistically relying on tropes of Romanticism to express the earnestness of Afrikaner nationalist morality. Another thread, referred to but not focussed on in this study, involves pratfall comedy primarily accompanied by twee, light orchestral library music. All these threads involve a level of escapism in the form of a preference for fantasy over engagement with relevant, real world issues. 200
Strategies of diegetic othering South African film music’s introduction of African music onto the extra-diegetic soundtrack is a slow and gradual process. Prior to African Jim, all African music is diegetic, an unambiguous statement by the nationalist-dominated cinema of the time that the people, their culture and world view were not part of the expressive universe of the filmmakers’ output. Slave singing for Gertruide in Simon Beyers is accepted as a humble tribute; but the filmmakers would never consider its use as the extra-diegetic soundtrack to express the pathos of Gertruide’s terminal illness.
Representation of a culture through diegetic music creates the illusion of “authenticity” regarding what those people are “really like”. It claims to show an unmediated image of that culture, even though the diegetic scenes may in fact be deeply mediated and artificially constructed. The reuse of the same musical material in Rhodes of Africa and King Solomon’s Mines to represent entirely different cultures, one fictional, the other real, demonstrates the disconnect between diegetic music and the reality of the people to whom it is attributed. This careless musical representation perpetuates stereotypes, and encourages viewers to look away from, rather than engage with, African music and culture. The bioscoring of Africans pre-1949 is not primarily aimed at representing their identity— its concern is with the identity of the white characters, and with establishing their superiority. The films’ insistence that African music provides no more than background colour, fulfilling colonial or nationalist expectations of African characterization, creates the potential for new readings through reinterpretation of foreground/background levels. Such readings offer potential avenues for deconstruction of the filmic narrative through introducing layers of meaning the filmmakers never intended to be included.
New strategies of perpetuating representational stereotypes are also developed, specifically the avoidance of specificity regarding cultural origin, as in Dingaka and The Naked Prey. This occurs in part because African music remains mediated through white composers, and because diegetic recordings are used in a decontextualized, and then recontextualized, manner. These negatives are offset by a more sensitive understanding of the resources available for musical representation, however, including the increased use of socially intimate forms of instrumental music, as opposed to en masse, war-oriented singing and 201 dancing. Related to this is an appreciation of African music as something to be enjoyed aesthetically, and as an important expressive element, rather than simply a means of signifying the stereotypes that colonial and nationalist mentalities associate with African peoples.
Music and land rights Land rights are fundamental to the history of the geographical space now known as South Africa, and to the relations between the cultures within that space. Afrikaner nationalism relies on the history of the interaction with land as the basis for its mythology. African peoples have undergone forceful and legislated displacement and dispossession, often because of nationalist policy. Such issues remain at the heart of South African politics. Unsurprisingly, then, both sides of the political spectrum have enlisted film music into this debate.
One of the most intriguing possibilities for film music as commentary on land ownership and land rights is the purposeful mismatch of music to visuals. In Come Back, Africa, this takes the form of a mismatch between white spaces and black music, representing the former through the latter, as a way of reclaiming space through music. While traditional film music theory would consider the music inappropriate to the visuals, in fact the visuals are inappropriate to the music, which belongs, while the whites-only city space does not. The Jackals offers a similar reading, scoring the landscape and resolutely ignoring the actions of the protagonists—they do not belong in the space, while the music does. The music’s apparent irrelevance to the film’s protagonists and their actions also seems to suggest the ghostly presence of previous inhabitants of the land, displaced by the white protagonists who nevertheless fail to resonate in their occupied space.
Another strategy of musical/visual mismatch is that of rural/urban contrast, in which rural African music accompanies scenes of urban soullessness or decay, a strategy used in Come Back, Africa and Dingaka that powerfully conveys the soullessness of apartheid as a tool of geographical displacement. Come Back, Africa also adopts the strategy of “mechanizing” rural music as a metaphor of the urban mechanization of rural Africans. 202
Afrikaner nationalist film likewise adopts a variety of strategies for implicating film music in its land agenda. Geboortegrond’s title theme represents the “eternal” bond between the Afrikaner people and the land, through repurposing music with no prior nationalist associations to fuse its meaning with the narrative focus on rurality as an Afrikaner calling, and to serve as a motif representing family, tradition and the soil. Other films address this bond through the trope of the pastoral, repurposed to represent South African land as a potential space for European agrarianism, as in Simon Beyers, and as a bucolic playground for wealthy Afrikaner youth, as in Debbie. Debbie also represents the “success” of Afrikaner nationalism through leisure time in national parks, accompanied musically through popular song and volksliedjies to once more promote an image of the unproblematic and uncontested right to these whites-only spaces. Kruger Miljoene aims for the same result by sentimentalizing land through song, laying claim to spaces through emotional attachment, and again through “Europeanizing” the South African landscape.
Paul Krüger adopts a strategy of analogy to establish its nationalist land agenda: opening with Sibelius’s Finlandia, it imports associations of freedom struggles against invading forces, with the Afrikaners clearly cast as the Finns, rather than as the British. It therefore invokes Finlandia as a land claim: as the Finns belong in Finland, so the Afrikaners belong in South Africa (or the South African Republic, in this particular case). The South African situation is complicated, however, by the Afrikaners’ ability to be cast in either role, as both invader and freedom fighter.
African music as dramatic, narrative, extra-diegetic underscore Although musical representation of black South Africans through African music does shift, gradually but increasingly, from the diegetic to the extra-diegetic narrative level, there are few examples of African music written unambiguously and explicitly for film, as opposed to the use of pre-existing African music on the extra-diegetic soundtrack. The likely explanation for this is not simply the ideological bias engendered by apartheid, but also the existence of the very practical impediments apartheid gave rise to, such as the inability to include black musicians in formal music studio recording sessions in a racially diverse context. 203
The Naked Prey is the only film that indisputably includes a specifically composed, extra- diegetic African soundtrack—notably, it was recorded outside the country, in London. The “African” music created to score the diegetic action has the potential to be very effective, yet it is curtailed by timbrally and structurally repetitive implementation. It demonstrates, however, that the adaptation of African music to an extra-diegetic filmic context is likely to require modification of playing technique and musical conceptualization, at least if the goal is the creation of a “traditional” film score following the functions of film music as shown in Figure 5 of Chapter 1. While The Naked Prey’s percussive approach may not fulfil its musical potential, it serves as a pioneer of “ethnic” percussion as a means of scoring action, a technique which has since become a staple of Hollywood scoring practice.
Come Back, Africa and The Jackals provide models of extra-diegetic African music taken from pre-existing sources: in Come Back, Africa, the extra-diegetic material tends to occur over moments of narrative stasis, such as the opening credits and transition scenes. It therefore avoids explicit mismatches of musical content with narrative progression. The Jackals is full of such mismatches, but as discussed, these provide opportunity for a reading of the film as a statement about land rights.
Implications of the study Theoretical implications Comparing Afrikaans and African film-musical representation over the period of the study, most striking is the scope and rate of evolution of representation of black South Africans, while by contrast the representation of white South Africans barely changes from 1931 to 1969. The musical strategies of nationalist representation are in fact quite diverse, as an array of styles and techniques from various sources are harnessed to the nationalist agenda; yet the underlying nationalist concept undergoes very little progression. The most forward- looking nationalist score of this period, Geheim van Nantes, demonstrates how on a superficial level presentations of nationalism change over time, but the underlying ideological conceptualization of conservative, racist patriarchy remains unchanged.
From this perspective, musical representation of these groups perhaps highlights the inevitability of the end of apartheid: Afrikaner nationalist ideology, although obsessed with 204 progress and modernity, is ideologically static and reliant on a backward-looking, historical self-conceptualization. There is minimal development, for instance, between the anthemic, patriotic representation of Afrikaner triumphalism that ends Building a Nation in 1938 and the similar use of national anthems in Paul Krüger, Die Ruiter in die Nag and Majuba in 1956, 1963 and 1968 respectively. African self-image, on the other hand, is forward- looking, adapting and evolving, moving towards the future rather than attempting to attain some past nostalgic ideal. There is irony in the nationalists’ active thwarting of black South African progress through legislation such as the 1953 Bantu Education Act, and a belief that white South Africa represented European progress while Africans were “traditional” and backward.1 The double irony is that the nationalists recognized the threat of African progress, which necessitated the legislation of non-progress to begin with.
South African film music studies as a field suggests certain approaches unique to itself that can perhaps serve as useful models for the (re-)interpretation of film music in other industries. In particular, my study draws attention to the role of the diegetic/extra-diegetic divide2 in relation to musical representation, and specifically to how this conceptualization of narrative levels is manipulated as a strategy for othering of marginal groups. The function of diegetic/extra-diegetic levels in this regard has until now not been made sufficiently apparent. Use of the diegetic is not simply a means of enhancing “realism”, or “authenticity”. It can serve as a rejection of incorporation into the constraints of the expressive universe of the film, because it does not fit into the pre-existing expressive templates of film-musical language or, more importantly, of filmmakers’ worldviews.
Music and land rights is another topic that has been under-addressed in film music studies, but which, in a highly contested space such as South Africa, naturally emerges as an issue. Studies enacted of Native American representation in film, for instance, focus on style, and on Native Americans’ relationship to and conceptualization within mainstream American
1 See for instance Minister of Native Affairs Hendrik Verwoerd’s comment that “there is no place for [the Bantu] in the European community above the level of certain forms of labour. Until now he has been subjected to a school system which drew him away from his own community and misled him by showing him the green pastures of European society in which he is not allowed to graze” (quoted in Soudien and Kallaway 2012: 494). 2 Or continuum, as it is increasingly being regarded as. See Winters (2014) and Heldt (2013) for recent thinking regarding refinements of the diegetic/extra-diegetic relationship. 205 culture. The musical representation of the politics of land ownership remains, as far as I am aware, unaddressed. Since the majority of national film music studies have so far emerged from the previous colonial powers, rather than from previously colonized countries themselves, film music’s relationship to land rights is likely to be an increasingly important topic if and when film music studies emerges as a discipline in these latter countries.
My study explores the potential for African music as extra-diegetic underscore, though the number of examples of such in the period under discussion is limited. The feasibility of such a concept, or the status of its current development, requires scholarly intervention to map out its past, present and future trajectory, and to provide the results to other scholars and to industry practitioners. This would allow the creation of a theory of film music as it pertains to African film, and from a practical standpoint, would allow for the creation of a film musical style that is more than simply a clone of Hollywood practice, which is a danger the country’s film industry currently faces.
Policy implications Although the study of South African film music I present here is historical in nature, and does not attempt to address issues of identity in the contemporary South African film industry, the experience of watching a selection of recent films suggests that this study has implications for the film industry today regarding the use of music, and that acknowledgement of these implications would potentially have value.3 Primarily, it is important not to take musical representation for granted. This means that foreign composers ignorant of the country, its people and their music should not be prioritized. Instead, local composers capable of paying attention to the implications of the score regarding meaning, representation and identity should be used, provided the composer is capable of creating music that will add its own level of meaningful representation to the
3 My opinion in this regard is corroborated by two recent articles, Letcher (2016a) and Letcher (2016b). These articles present analyses of two postapartheid South African films, Proteus (2003) and Goodbye Bafana (2007). The discussion of identity representation through film music makes it clear that many of the problematic issues identified in the current study remain in place in a more recent scoring environment. 206 project. Local relevance needs to be prioritized. Hollywood scoring style should not be considered the only, or proper, scoring style. Use of the symphony orchestra with homophonic, sparse scoring, heavily influenced by rock rhythmic structures, with pronounced large percussion such as taiko drums, are some of the prominent features of this style, as is the tendency to grant primacy to sound effects over music. All these techniques are valid and can be highly effective, but the unreflective or box-office-returns- oriented composer, producer and director equate these techniques with film scoring itself, which is in fact a much broader and more varied field of musical style.
Relationship to the field Limitations of the study This study has largely focussed on the audiovisual texts themselves to draw conclusions about the functioning of film music in relation to the dialogue and visual elements it accompanies. There is plenty of scope for further research to flesh out the technological, social, economic and aesthetic issues surrounding the creation of film music in South Africa. The period of the study is also limited—the industry grows in complexity in the 1970s and 1980s, so inclusion of this period in the current study was not practical.
I have omitted much of the material gathered for this research due to space constraints. A number of additional themes were planned that were eventually excised from the final document. The greatest omission is a planned chapter on liberal and alternative films. This chapter focussed on a number of important films in the South African oeuvre, some of which have received considerable attention (in terms of film criticism, rather than film music criticism) and others of which have hardly received mention in the literature on South African film. Among the more well known titles are the films by Jans Rautenbach, including Die Kandidaat (1968), Katrina (1969) and Jannie Totsiens (1970), due to their near-unique position as mainstream films that engage in explicit criticism of the political status quo. Less frequently referred to are the films of Emil Nofal, including King Hendrik (1965) and Wild Season (1967), which engage in occasional satire of South Africa’s more earnest political and social practices. Inclusion of this chapter would have ensured coverage of the three major trends of film production during this period, covering the main 207 points on the political spectrum from the “radical” left, to the liberal middle, to the nationalist right. Instead, I was obliged to follow a left/right binary organization.
Suggestions for further research At present, almost no information exists in the public sphere regarding the lives and working conditions of South African film music composers. The conditions of their employment and their relationships to other members of the filmmaking team are unknown. The nature of the ensembles that played the music, and the conditions under which this took place, are also virtually unknown, limited to one or two references. Documentation and analysis of these phenomena would greatly enhance knowledge of the history of the industry. Such a process would need to include an exhaustive search through unconventional sources, many probably located in private collections, and interviews with surviving film and film music practitioners. Silent film music practice, including available scores, musicians and ensembles involved and the culture of film music production in theatres, would also be of scholarly interest, although discovery of relevant material would likely be even more difficult. An excellent starting place for the discovery of all the above information may be to track down archival materials related to African Film Productions.
Many films from the period under discussion in this project are deserving of further study. Gordon Vorster’s output is unique, including Die Vlugteling (1960),4 Basie (1961), and Die Tweede Slaapkamer (1962), which all include themes of delinquent Afrikaner youth and their musical subculture, and Jy’s Lieflik Vanaand (1962), which, although uncritical of social and political status quos, takes an entertaining tongue-in-cheek (and historically interesting) approach to Afrikaner popular light music culture. Ivan Hall’s Dr Kalie (1968) presents an informative picture of 1960s “progressive” youth culture (in terms of fashion rather than politics) in a postmodern narrative framework, with similarities in conception to Michelangelo Antonioni’s Blow-Up (1966), for instance. Jamie Uys’s Dirkie (1969) has
4 The scene in which the protagonist arrives in the small village [0.15.36], captured with a tracking shot with the camera following in front as he walks down the middle of the main street, intercut with portrait shots of the locals he passes, is highly unusual in South African film of this era. Camera work that enhances the style and meaning of a production is almost non-existent. Unfortunately, the accompanying score is library music, although it is nevertheless an effective pairing with the visuals. 208 a larger footprint in popular culture than academia—comments on the film’s IMDb page suggest it has a significant following of nostalgic admirers from around the world who were profoundly affected by the film as children.5 A number of them testify to having subsequently searched for years to find a copy of the film, sometimes without even knowing its title or provenance (see Reviews and Ratings for Dirkie 2015).
The distinction between diegetic and extra-diegetic levels of music in relation to narrative plays an important role in my analysis and interpretation of representation of identity. In the context of this study’s aims and scope, which involved addressing a broad cross-section of genres across an equally broad political and chronological spectrum, covering material and, frequently, people, that for the most part have never received scholarly attention, this approach proved viable and, I trust, effective. Certain scholars have recently further investigated and refined the relationship and distinction between the diegetic and extra- diegetic levels, however (see Winters 2014 and Heldt 2013), going so far as to suggest that in certain situations the distinction may entirely dissolve, with consequences for characterization, the nature of filmic “reality”, and other aspects. A fruitful angle for further research may therefore be to revisit the films in the current study in light of these refinements, to determine if they offer the possibility for providing more nuanced understandings of identity in relation to film music.
Concluding remarks This study set out to rectify a crucial omission in the literature of South African film studies, and film music studies as a national and international phenomenon. The gap still exists, but is now I hope somewhat smaller. By adding to the small but growing number of diverse accounts of non-mainstream film music, the study has hopefully assisted in contributing alternative data sets and methodologies to the field of film music theory and analysis, which, through its focus predominantly on mainstream practice, risks a monocultural interpretation. As one of the few studies to explore representation of African peoples through film music, I also hope it will contribute to a wider appreciation of the unique role of African music as a filmic phenomenon.
5 The international version of the film (which has significantly more accomplished music and editing) was released in English as Lost in the Desert. 209 Sources Referenced
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Wojcik, P. and Arthur Knight (eds). 2002. Soundtrack available: essays on film and popular music. Durham, N.C: Duke University Press.
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232
Sound recordings Andara Music Workshop Participant. 1988. Mbira Song: DD113-11. Ilam Digital Sound Archive. Accessed 10 February 2015. http://greenstone.ilam.ru.ac.za/cgi-bin/library?e=q- 01000-00---0ilam--00-1--0-10-0---0---0prompt-10-DC--4------0-1l--11-en-50---20- about-mbira--00-3-1-00-0011-1-0utfZz-8- 00&a=d&c=ilam&srp=0&srn=0&cl=search&d=D16474.
Chris Blignaut and The Melodians. 2013 [1931]. Sarie Marais (in Afrikaans) with images of the Boer War. YouTube. Accessed 10 November 2014. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AYe2lqQcues.
DeroVolk. 2014. National Anthem of the Orange Free State (1854-1902) - "Vrystaatse Volkslied". YouTube. Accessed 27 April 2015. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AfaCZjXXQxA.
Flag&Anthem. 2012. Republic of Transvaal / Transvaal Republiek (1848-1902). YouTube. Accessed 23 April 2015. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TVCMvtpt0Rk.
Lal, C., Kanai Dutta, Ramabhadran, and Sivaraman. No date. Drums of North & South India. [Vinyl]. World Pacific Records.
Maghundu, M. 1988. Kwereka Kuwa Kudya marungera: DD113-13. Ilam Digital Sound Archive. Accessed 10 February 2015. http://greenstone.ilam.ru.ac.za/cgi-bin/library?e=d- 01000-00---0ilam--00-1--0-10-0---0---0prompt-10---4------0-1l--11-en-50---20-about--- 00-3-1-00-0011-1-0utfZz-8-00&a=d&c=ilam&cl=CL3.291&d=D16476.
Makeba, M. 2012 [1959]. Miriam Makeba sings "Into Yam" from Come Back, Africa. YouTube. Accessed 14 March 2015. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Buod66bq0cg.
Oliounidizlove. 2012 [1957]. Elvis Presley Lonesome Cowboy. YouTube. Accessed 18 September 2017. https://youtu.be/AsRFTZnoWa4.
Roach, M. 2014 [1960]. We Insist! Max Roach’s Freedom Now Suite. YouTube. Accessed 17 February 2015. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UsvFzXr-o-8. 233
Various Artists. 1966. African music from the film – The Naked Prey. [download]. South Africa: Folkways Records.
Verwoerdburg. 2007. Transvaalse Volkslied. YouTube. Accessed 24 April 2015. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A-1OremG15c.
234
Films 2001: A Space Odyssey. 1968. [DVD] Stanley Kubrick. United Kingdom: MGM.
A Clockwork Orange. 1971. [Online] Stanley Kubrick. United Kingdom: Warner Bros. Accessed 2 November 2013. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6uEJRmoIDVc.
A Dry White Season. 1989. [DVD] Euzhan Palcy. USA: MGM.
African Jim. 1949. [TV] Donald Swanson. South Africa: Warrior Films.
Alles sal Regkom. 1951. [DVD] Hyman Kirstein. South Africa: African Film Productions.
Altyd in my Drome. 1952. [DVD] Pierre de Wet. South Africa: African Film Productions. andrew67ist. 2013. [Online] The Alps from above - The swiss Alps with music by Thomas Bergersen from the Album Illusions. YouTube. Accessed 9 July 2015. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R2dX6R7VRH8.
As Ons Twee Eers Getroud is. 1962. [DVD] Jan Perold. South Africa: S.A. Screen Productions.
Basie. 1961. [DVD] Gordon Vorster. South Africa: S.A. Screen Productions.
Blow-Up. 1966. [TV] Michelangelo Antonioni. United Kingdom: Bridge Films.
Boerboel de Wet. 1961. [DVD] Al Debbo. South Africa: Irene Film Studios.
Building a Nation. 1938. [VHS] Joseph Albrecht. South Africa: African Film Productions/South African Railway Services.
Cabin in the Sky. 1943. [DVD] Vincente Minnelli. USA: MGM.
Casablanca. 1942. [TV] Michael Curtiz. USA: Warner Bros.
Code 7, Victim 5 [aka Table Bay]. 1964. [DVD] Robert Lynn. UK: Towers of London Productions.
Come Back, Africa. 1959. [DVD] Lionel Rogosin. USA: Lionel Rogosin Films. 235
Cry Freedom. 1987. [DVD] Richard Attenborough. United Kingdom: Marble Arch Productions.
Cry, the Beloved Country. 1951. [DVD] Zoltan Korda. United Kingdom: London Film Productions.
Daar Doer in die Bosveld. 1951. [DVD] Jamie Uys. South Africa: Raath Films.
Daar doer in die Fliek. 2012. [DVD] Leon van Nierop. South Africa: M-Net Productions.
Daar Doer in die Stad. 1954. [DVD] Jamie Uys. South Africa: African Film Productions.
Danie Bosman. 1969. [DVD] Elmo de Witt. South Africa: Kavalier Films.
Die Bou van ‘n Nasie. 1938. [16mm] Joseph Albrecht. South Africa: African Film Productions/South African Railway Services.
Die Jagters. 1960. [DVD] Gordon Vorster. South Africa: Suidafrikaanse Rolprentproduksies.
Die Kandidaat. 1968. [DVD] Jans Rautenbach. South Africa: Emil Nofal Films.
Die Kavaliers. 1966. [DVD] Elmo de Witt. South Africa: Kavalier Films.
Die Ruiter in die Nag. 1963. [DVD] Jan Perold. South Africa: Suidafrikaanse Rolprentproduksies.
Die Tweede Slaapkamer. 1962. [DVD] Gordon Vorster: Suidafrikaanse Rolprentproduksies.
Die Vlugteling. 1960. [DVD] Gordon Vorster. South Africa: Suidafrikaanse Rolprentproduksies.
Dingaka. 1964. [VHS] Jamie Uys. South Africa: Jamie Uys Film Productions.
Dilemma. 1962. [TV] Henning Carlsen. Denmark/South Africa. Carlsen Films.
Dirkie. 1969. [DVD] Jamie Uys. South Africa: Mimosa Film Productions. 236
Dis Lekker om te Lewe. 1957. [DVD] Pierre de Wet. South Africa: African Film Productions.
Dr Kalie. 1968. [DVD] Ivan Hall. South Africa: Kavalier Films. emiratesperfumes. 2011. [Online] Peaceful Swiss Music, Alps, Alpine, Relaxing, Meditation, Stunning Switzerland Photos. YouTube. Accessed 9 July 2015.
En die Vonke Spat. 1961. [DVD] Pierre de Wet. South Africa: S.A. Screen Productions.
Fratse in die Vloot. 1958. [DVD] Pierre de Wet. South Africa: African Film Productions.
From the Manger to the Cross. 1912. [Online] Sidney Olcott. USA. Warner Bros. Accessed 12 February 2014. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vgYERr99yCQ. Accessed 3 August 2015. https://archive.org/details/JesusOfNazareth1912.
Geboortegrond. 1946. [DVD] Pierre de Wet. South Africa: African Film Productions.
Geheim van Nantes. 1969. [DVD] Dirk de Villiers. South Africa: Kavalier Films.
Geheim van Onderplaas. 1962. [DVD] Al Debbo. South Africa: Irene Film Studios.
Hans die Skipper. 1953. [DVD] Bladon Peake. South Africa: African Film Productions.
Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone. 2001. [DVD] Chris Columbus. United States: Warner Bros.
Hier’s Ons Weer. 1950. [DVD] Hyman Kirstein. South Africa: African Film Productions.
Hoor my Lied. 1967. [DVD] Elmo de Witt. South Africa: Kavalier Films.
In Darkest Hollywood: Cinema and Apartheid. 1993. [VHS] Peter Davis and Daniel Riesenfeld. South Africa: Film Resource Unit: Video Library & Distribution Service.
Inspan. 1953. [DVD] Bladon Peake. South Africa: African Film Productions.
Jannie Totsiens. 1970. [DVD] Jans Rautenbach. South Africa: Sewentig Film Productions. 237
Jy is my Liefling. 1968. [DVD] Dirk de Villiers. South Africa: Kavalier Films.
Jy’s Lieflik Vanaand. 1962. [DVD] Gordon Vorster. South Africa: S.A. Screen Productions.
Katrina. 1969. [DVD] Jans Rautenbach. South Africa: Emil Nofal Films.
Kimberley Jim. 1963. [Online] Emil Nofal. South Africa: Jamie Uys Film Productions. Accessed 12 November 2014. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TTh0t1wtUSs.
King Hendrik. 1965. [DVD] Emil Nofal. South Africa: Emil Nofal Films.
King Kong. 1933. [Online] Merian Cooper and Ernest Schoedsack. USA: RKO Radio Pictures. Accessed 31 October 2013. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hzcD7eUE0G4.
King Solomon’s Mines. 1937. [Online] Robert Stevenson. United Kingdom: Gaumont British Picture Corporation. Accessed 25 October 2013. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xoW3MnrQnEQ.
Kom Saam, Vanaand. 1949. [DVD] Pierre de Wet. South Africa: African Film Productions.
Kruger Miljoene. 1967. [DVD] Ivan Hall. South Africa: Kavalier Films.
Majuba. 1968. [DVD] David Millin. South Africa: Killarney Film Studios.
Matieland. 1955. [DVD] Pierre de Wet. South Africa: African Film Productions.
Moedertjie. 1931. [DVD] Joseph Albrecht. South Africa: African Film Productions.
‘n Plan is ‘n Boerdery. 1954. [DVD] Pierre de Wet. South Africa: African Film Productions.
Ohm Krüger. 1941. [Online] Hans Steinhoff. Germany: Tobis Filmkunst. Accessed 19 April 2015. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_-5fHmOMxA.
Once Upon a Time in the West. 1968. [Online] Sergio Leone. Italy: Finanzia San Marco. Accessed 3 November 2013. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2B2gKcLkygI. 238
Oupa en die Plaasnooientjie. 1960. [DVD] Pierre de Wet. South Africa: S.A. Screen Productions.
Paul Krüger. 1956. [DVD] Werner Grünbauer. South Africa: Film Produksie Fasiliteite Afrika.
Photographing Fairies. 1997. [Online] Nick Willing. United Kingdom: Arts Council of England. Accessed 2 November 2013. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iXE83muPjpc.
Piet my Niggie. 1964. [DVD] Jan Perold. South Africa: S.A. Screen Productions.
Piet se Tante. 1959. [DVD] Pierre de Wet. South Africa: S.A. Screen Productions.
Pinkie se Erfenis. 1946. [16mm] Pierre de Wet. South Africa: Utolo Films.
Rhodes of Africa. 1936. [Online] Berthold Viertel. United Kingdom: Gaumont British Picture Corporation. Accessed 29 October 2013. http://www.netflix.com/WiPlayer?movieid=70160345&trkid=13752289.
Rip van Wyk. 1960. [DVD] Emil Nofal. South Africa: Jamie Uys Film Productions.
San Francisco. 1936. [Online: excerpt] W.S. Van Dyke. USA: Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Accessed 02 July 2015. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-A19Fx7A_GI.
Sarie Marais. 1931. [16mm] Joseph Albrecht. South Africa: African Film Productions.
Sarie Marais. 1949. [DVD] C. Francis Coley. South Africa: Unifilms.
Simon Beyers. 1947. [DVD] Pierre de Wet. South Africa: S.A. Film Company.
Sleepless in Seattle. 1993. [Online] Nora Ephron. USA: TriStar Pictures. Accessed 22 March 2015. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B_KqAktEbIU.
Song of Africa. 1951. [VHS] Emil Nofal. South Africa: African Film Productions.
Song of Freedom. 1936. [Online] J. Elder Wills. United Kingdom: British Lion Studios. Accessed 6 January 2015. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=15UfhhydrUw. 239
Stormy Weather. 1943. [Online] Andrew Stone. USA: Twentieth Century Fox. Accessed 31 January 2015. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ras01nlZqbY.
The Informer. 1935. [Online] John Ford. USA: RKO Radio Pictures. Accessed 31 October 2013. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XOtO19n8vcY.
The Jackals. 1967. [DVD] Robert D. Webb. South Africa: Killarney Film Studios.
The Magic Garden. 1951. [16mm] Donald Swanson. South Africa: Swan Films.
The Naked Prey. 2007 [1966]. [DVD] Cornel Wilde. USA: Paramount Pictures and Theodora Productions.
The Shining. 1980. [DVD] Stanley Kubrick. United Kingdom. Warner Bros.
Titanic. 1943. [Online] Herbert Selpin. Germany: Tobis Filmkunst. Accessed 02 July 2015. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HvWPDG2EjCI.
Tom, Dirk en Herrie. 1962. [DVD] Al Debbo. South Africa: Irene Film Studios.
Untamed. 1955. [iTunes] Henry King. USA: Twentieth Century Fox.
Voor Sononder. 1962. [DVD] Emil Nofal. South Africa: Jamie Uys Film Productions.
What the Future Sounded Like. 2007. [Online] Matthew Bate. Australia: Porthmeor Productions. Accessed 28 February 2017. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8KkW8Ul7Q1I.
Wild Season. 1967. [DVD] Emil Nofal. South Africa: Emil Nofal Films.
Zonk!. 1950. [VHS] Hyman Kirstein. South Africa: African Film Productions.
Zulu. 1964. [Online] Cy Endfield. United Kingdom: Diamond Films. Accessed 11 December 2014. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gpSI3pq-fVc. 240 Appendix A South African Feature Film Composers, 1931-1969 A
Adams, Bob Ride the High Wind (1965), The Second Sin (1966), Escape Route Cape Town (1967), The Jackals (1967), Majuba (1968) Adler, Larry The Hellions (1961) African Inkspots, The African Jim (1949), Song of Africa (1951) Astley, Edwin Journey to Nowhere (1963), The Naked Prey (1966)
B
Barry, John Zulu (1964) Bath, Hubert Rhodes of Africa (1936) Baxter, Les Sammy Going South (1962) Berman, Charles Zonk! (1950) [music director], Song of Africa (1951) [music director] Bernard, James Nor the Moon by Night (1958) Bill Kimber and The Couriers Africa Shakes (1966) Black Broadway Boys Song of Africa (1951) Bosman, Danie Hier’s Ons Weer (1950), Danie Bosman (1969) Brian Poole and The Tremeloes Africa Shakes (1966) Bruce, Max Geboortegrond (1946)
C
Campbell, Colin Strangers at Sunrise (1969) Carstens, Nico Hier’s Ons Weer (1950), ‘n Plan is ‘n Boerdery (1954), Geld Soos Bossies (1955), Die Wonderwêreld van Kammie Kamfer (1964), Stadig oor die Klippe (1969) Cary, Tristram Sammy Going South (1962), A Twist of Sand (1969) 241
Cherry, Richard Rip van Wyk (1960) Chris Blignaut and the Melodians Sarie Marais (1931) Cluver, Gus In die Lente van Ons Liefde (1967) Coetser, Tienie Hier’s Ons Weer (1950) Combrinck, Louis Jy’s Lieflik Vanaand (1962) Connell, John Building a Nation (1938)
D
Dana Valery Africa Shakes (1966) Dankworth, John Sands of the Kalahari (1965) Davie, Cedric Thorpe The Adventurers (1950) De Masi, Francesco Operation Yellow Viper (1966) De Waal, Anton Daar Doer in die Bosveld (1951), ‘n Plan is ‘n Boerdery (1954), Geld Soos Bossies (1955), Jy’s Lieflik Vanaand (1962), Stadig oor die Klippe (1969) Domingo, Eddie Dingaka (1964) [lyrics] Douglas, Johnny Code 7, Victim 5 (1964), Mozambique (1966) D.R.C. Choir Song of Africa (1951) Du Preez, Michael The Long Red Shadow (1968)
E
Egnos, Bertha Dingaka (1964) Esaul, George As die Aarde Skeur (1961), Jy’s Lieflik Vanaand (1962)
F
Four Jacks and a Jill Die Professor en die Prikkelpop (1967) G
Gallois-Montbrun, Raymond Cry, the Beloved Country (1951) Gertz, Irving The Fiercest Heart (1961) Gibson, Gilbert Dirkie (1969) Glasser, Stanley Last of the Few (1960) 242
Gouws, Hansie Hier’s Ons Weer (1950) Gray, Basil Dingaka (1964) Grobler Broers, Die Nooi Van My Hart (1959)
H
Heatley, Art Dirkie (1969) Hendrik Susan en Sy Orkes Alles sal Regkom (1951), Altyd in my Drome (1952)
J
Jazz Maniacs, The African Jim (1949) K
Keenan, Les Die Goddelose Stad (1958) Kentridge, Joe Ride the High Wind (1965), The Second Sin (1966), Escape Route Cape Town (1967), The Jackals (1967), Majuba (1968) Kikillus, Taffy Hier’s Ons Weer (1950), ‘n Plan is ‘n Boerdery (1954), Donker Afrika (1957), Fratse in die Vloot (1958), Hou die Blinkkant Bo (1960), Gevaarlike Spel (1962)
L
Lal, Chatur Come Back, Africa (1959) Lamprecht, Chris Debbie (1965) Lamprecht, Con Lig van ‘n Eeu (1942), Die Kavaliers (1966), Hoor my Lied (1967), Kruger Miljoene (1967), Jy is my Liefling (1968), Die Geheim van Nantes (1969) Le Roux Marais, S. Lig van ‘n Eeu (1942), Hier’s Ons Weer (1950), Ek Sal Opstaan (1959) Loose, William Dirkie (1969) Loussier, Jacques Dark of the Sun (1968)
M
Manning, Charles Building a Nation (1938) 243
Marchetti, Gianni King of Africa (1968) Martin, Roy Lord Oom Piet (1962), Seven Against the Sun (1964), Wild Season (1967), Die Kandidaat (1968), One for the Pot (1968), Katrina (1969)
N
Newcater, Graham Raka (1968) Nxumalo, Gideon Dilemma (1962)
O
O’Reilly, Stephen Dingaka (1964), The Foster Gang (1964) Oosthuizen, Betsy In die Lente van Ons Liefde (1967)
P
Parker, Clifton Diamond City (1949) Petersen Broers, Die ‘n Plan is ‘n Boerdery (1954), Nooi Van My Hart (1959) Pienaar, Chicken In die Lente van Ons Liefde (1967) Pohl, Jan Kom Saam, Vanaand (1949), Dis Lekker om te Lewe (1957), Nooi Van My Hart (1959), Piet se Tante (1959), Oupa en die Plaasnooientjie (1960), Man in die Donker (1962), Huis op Horings (1963) Proctor Mondfluitjie Orkes, Die ‘n Plan is ‘n Boerdery (1954)
R
Ramokgopa, Matome “Tommy” The Magic Garden (1951) Rawsthorne, Alan Where No Vultures Fly (1951), West of Zanzibar (1954) Richfield, S. Lig van ‘n Eeu (1942) Roach, Max Dilemma (1962)
S
Samuel Maile and The Zonk Band Zonk! (1950) Schifrin, Lalo Rhino (1964) 244
Segal, Joe Wanneer die Masker Val (1955) Settlers, The Africa Shakes (1966) Sharon Tandy Africa Shakes (1966) Sklair, Sam Die Jagters (1960), Hans en die Rooinek (1961), Diamond Walkers (1965), King Hendrik (1965), Tokoloshe (1965), All the Way to Paris (1966), Dr Kalie (1968), Dirkie (1969), Staal Burger (1969), Jannie Totsiens (1970) Slaney, Ivor Journey to Nowhere (1963) Spoliansky, Mischa King Solomon’s Mines (1937), Duel in the Jungle (1954) Strasser, Hugo Gevaarlike Reis (1961)
T
Torch, Sidney Death Drums along the River (1964) Tracey, Andrew The Naked Prey (1966) Trede, Gerhard Oupa for Sale (1968), Die Vervlakste Tweeling (1969) Trewhela, Ralph The Magic Garden (1951)
U
Una Valli Africa Shakes (1966) V
Van Loggerenberg Skadu van Gister (1961) Van Niekerk, Dolf In die Lente van Ons Liefde (1967) Van Niekerk, Manley Debbie (1965) Van Rooyen, Ernst Daar Doer in die Bosveld (1951) Van Tonder, Riekie In die Lente van Ons Liefde (1967)
W
Walker, Bill Kimberley Jim (1963) Waxman, Franz Untamed (1955) Whelen, Christopher Coast of Skeletons (1965) Wilde, Cornel The Naked Prey (1966) 245
Willox, Al Die Bubbles Schroeder Storie (1961) Wilman, Dennis Vrolike Vrydag die 13de (1969) 246 Appendix B Feature Films by Genre with Composers, 1931-1969
As noted in the literature review in Chapter 1, a number of sources provide chronological lists of South African films. The list provided here is therefore presented somewhat differently, namely by genre, then chronologically within those genre categories, and alphabetically within each year. Through this method of organization an impression can be gained of the trends towards popularity of particular genres at particular times. The film genre categorizations are in most cases based on the films’ IMDb genre listings, or on Moses (date unknown) and Fourie (1982), or on my own interpretation if none of these sources is forthcoming.
Many films from the 1950s especially have a hybrid approach to the score. Frequently these films will credit local South African musicians as the composer/s. In reality, these musicians have not written the underscore; instead, they provide diegetic onscreen performance, typically in the context of a dance or at a club. The underscore, meanwhile, consists entirely of library music. Frequent names that come up in this regard are Hendrik Susan, Taffy Kikillus and Nico Carstens, to name a few. Where the names of musicians who functioned in this manner are listed after the name of a film below, they are distinguished by being set in square brackets, usually following the description “Library”. The same method is applied to artists who compose and perform a film’s theme song but are not responsible for its underscore.
247
Action Die Bloedrooi Papawer (1960) Unknown Stropers van die Laeveld (1962) Unknown The Second Sin (1966) Bob Adams, Joe Kentridge
Action/adventure King Solomon’s Mines (1937) Mischa Spoliansky Die Sewende Horison (1958) Unknown Code 7, Victim 5 [aka Table Bay] (1964) Johnny Douglas Rhino (1964) Lalo Schifrin Diamond Walkers (1965) Sam Sklair King of Africa [aka One Step to Hell] (1968) Gianni Marchetti
Action/drama Dingaka (1964) Eddie Domingo, Bertha Egnos, Basil Gray Operation Yellow Viper (1966) Francesco de Masi Knock-Out (1969) Unknown
Adventure The Adventurers (1950) Cedric Thorpe Davie Duel in the Jungle (1954) Mischa Spoliansky West of Zanzibar (1954) Alan Rawsthorne Untamed (1955) Franz Waxman Diamonds are Dangerous (1961) Unknown Gevaarlike Reis (1961) Hugo Strasser The Fiercest Heart (1961) Irving Gertz Sammy Going South (1962) Tristram Cary, Les Baxter Death Drums along the River [aka Sanders] (1964) Sidney Torch Ride the High Wind [aka African Gold ] (1965) Bob Adams, Joe Kentridge Sands of the Kalahari (1965) John Dankworth A Twist of Sand (1969) Tristram Cary Dirkie [aka Lost in the Desert] (1969) Gilbert Gibson, Art Heatley, William Loose, Sam Sklair 248
Adventure/comedy Donker Afrika (1957) [Taffy Kikillus]
Adventure/drama Diamond City (1949) Clifton Parker Where No Vultures Fly (1951) Alan Rawsthorne Inspan (1953) Library Coast of Skeletons (1965) Christopher Whelen The Naked Prey (1966) Edwin Astley, Andrew Tracey, Cornel Wilde
Ballet Raka (1968) Graham Newcater
Biography Rhodes of Africa (1936) Hubert Bath
Biography/drama Paul Krüger (1956) Library Danie Bosman (1969) Danie Bosman
Comedy Die Wildsboudjie (1946) Library Die Pantoffelregering (1947) Unknown Dr. Kwak (1947) Library Hier’s Ons Weer (1950) Danie Bosman, Nico Carstens, Tienie Coetser, Hansie Gouws, Taffy Kikillus, S. le Roux Marais Alles sal Regkom (1951) Library. [Hendrik Susan en Sy Orkes] Daar Doer in die Bosveld (1951) Anton de Waal, Ernst van Rooyen Fifty/Vyftig (1953) Unknown Daar Doer in die Stad (1954) Library ‘n Plan is ‘n Boerdery (1954) Library [Anton de Waal, Nico Carstens, Taffy Kikillus, Die Petersen Broers, Die Proctor Mondfluitjie-Orkes] Geld Soos Bossies (1955) Nico Carstens, Anton de Waal Matieland (1955) Library 249
Dis Lekker om te Lewe (1957) Library [Jan Pohl] Die Bosvelder (1958) Unknown Fratse in die Vloot (1958) Library [Taffy Kikillus] Die Wildeboere (1959) Unknown Nooi Van My Hart (1959) Library, Jan Pohl, Die Petersen Broers, Die Grobbler Broers Piet se Tante (1959) Library [Jan Pohl] Hou die Blinkkant Bo (1960) Library [Taffy Kikillus] Oupa en die Plaasnooientjie (1960) Library [Jan Pohl] Boerboel de Wet (1961) Library En die Vonke Spat (1961) Library Hans en die Rooinek (1961) Sam Sklair As Ons Twee Eers Getroud is (1962) Library Die Tweede Slaapkamer (1962) Library Lord Oom Piet (1962) Roy Martin Tom, Dirk en Herrie (1962) Library Huis op Horings (1963) Jan Pohl Die Wonderwêreld van Kammie Kamfer (1964) Nico Carstens Piet my Niggie (1964) Library King Hendrik (1965) Sam Sklair All the Way to Paris (1966) Sam Sklair One for the Pot (1968) Roy Martin Oupa for Sale (1968) Gerhard Trede Die Vervlakste Tweeling (1969) Gerhard Trede Petticoat Safari (1969) Unknown Staal Burger (1969) Sam Sklair Stadig oor die Klippe (1969) Vrolike Vrydag die 13de (1969) Dennis Wilman
Comedy/drama Basie (1961) Library Die Professor en die Prikkelpop (1967) Library [Four Jacks and a Jill] Dr Kalie (1968) Sam Sklair 250
Comedy/fantasy Altyd in my Drome (1952) Library [Hendrik Susan en Sy Orkes] Rip van Wyk (1960) Richard Cherry
Crime Die Bubbles Schroeder Storie (1961) Al Willox Crime/drama Gevaarlike Spel (1962) Library [Taffy Kikillus] Journey to Nowhere (1963) Edwin Astley, Ivor Slaney Mozambique (1966) Johnny Douglas
Documentary Newels oor Mont-Aux-Sources (1942) Silent Documentary/drama Come Back, Africa (1959) Chatur Lal
Drama Sarie Marais (1931) Chris Blignaut and the Melodians Moedertjie (1931) Classical arrangements ‘n Dogter van die Veld (1933) Unknown Lig van ‘n Eeu (1942) S. le Roux Marais, S. Richfield, Con Lamprecht Ons Staan ‘n Dag Oor (1942) Silent Donker Spore (1944) Classical excerpts Die Skerpioen (1946) Library Geboortegrond (1946) Max Bruce Pinkie se Erfenis (1946) Library Simon Beyers (1947) Library Sarie Marais (1949) Library Cry, the Beloved Country (1951) Raymond Gallois-Montbrun Hans die Skipper (1953) Library Wanneer die Masker Val (1955) Joe Segal Die Goddelose Stad (1958) Les Keenan Nor the Moon by Night (1958) James Bernard 251
Ek Sal Opstaan (1959) S. le Roux Marais [theme song] Satanskoraal (1959) Library The Desert Inn (1959) Unknown Die Jagters (1960) Sam Sklair Die Vlugteling (1960) Library Kyk na die Sterre (1960) Unknown As die Aarde Skeur [aka Tremor] (1961) George Esaul Die Hele Dorp Weet (1961) Unknown Moord in Kompartement 1001E (1961) Unknown Skadu van Gister (1961) Hennie van Loggerenberg Die Skelm van die Limpopo (1962) Unknown Dilemma (1962) Gideon Nxumalo, Max Roach Geheim van Onderplaas (1962) Library Man in die Donker (1962) Jan Pohl Die Reën Kom Weer (1963) Unknown Gee My Jou Hand (1963) Unknown The Foster Gang (1964) Stephen O’Reilly Debbie (1965) Chris Lamprecht, Manley van Niekerk Die Voortreflike Familie Smit (1965) Unknown Tokoloshe (1965) Sam Sklair Bennie-Boet (1967) Unknown Die Jakkals van Tula Metsi (1967) Unknown Wild Season (1967) Roy Martin Twee Broeders Ry Saam (1968) Unknown
Drama/nature Last of the Few (1960) Stanley Glasser Drama/romance Vadertjie Langbeen (1955) Library In die Lente van Ons Liefde (1967) Gus Cluver, Betsie Oosthuizen, Chicken Pienaar, Dolf van Niekerk, Riekie van Tonder Die Geheim van Nantes (1969) Con Lamprecht 252
Katrina (1969) Roy Martin
Drama/thriller Escape Route Cape Town [aka The Cape Town Affair] (1967) Bob Adams, Joe Kentridge Drama/war Die Ruiter in die Nag (1963) Library Seven Against the Sun (1964) Roy Martin Zulu (1964) John Barry Dark of the Sun (1968) Jacques Loussier
Epic Building a Nation (1938) John Connell, Charles Manning
Horror/mystery/romance Jannie Totsiens (1970) Sam Sklair
Musical African Jim (1949) The African Inkspots, the Jazz Maniacs Kom Saam, Vanaand (1949) Jan Pohl Zonk! (1950) Samuel Maile and The Zonk Band, Charles Berman [music director] Song of Africa (1951) The African Inkspots, The Black Broadway Boys, D.R.C. Choir, Charles Berman [music director] Jy’s Lieflik Vanaand (1962) George Esaul Africa Shakes (1966) Bill Kimber and The Couriers, Brian Poole and The Tremeloes, The Settlers, Sharon Tandy, Dana Valery, Una Valli Hoor my Lied (1967) Con Lamprecht
Musical/comedy The Magic Garden (1951) Matome “Tommy” Ramokgopa, Ralph Trewhela Kimberley Jim (1963) Bill Walker Jy is my Liefling (1968) Con Lamprecht
Musical/war Kruger Miljoene (1967) Con Lamprecht 253
Political drama Doodkry is Min (1961) Unknown
Science fiction Hands of Space (1961) Unknown Thriller Spore in die Modder (1961) Unknown Die Kandidaat (1968) Roy Martin The Long Red Shadow (1968) Michael du Preez
War Die Kavaliers (1966) Con Lamprecht Majuba (1968) Bob Adams and Joe Kentridge
Western The Hellions (1961) Larry Adler Voor Sononder (1962) Library The Jackals (1967) Bob Adams, Joe Kentridge Strangers at Sunrise (1969) Colin Campbell
Unknown Strange Princess (1942) Unknown Oom Piet se Plaas (1949) Unknown Die Leeu van Punda Maria (1954) Unknown Find Livingstone (1968) Unknown 254 Appendix C Feature Films by Date with Composers, 1931-1969
1930s
1931 Moedertjie Classical arrangements Sarie Marais Chris Blignaut and the Melodians
1933 ‘n Dogter van die Veld Unknown
1936 Rhodes of Africa Hubert Bath
1937 King Solomon’s Mines Mischa Spoliansky
1938 Building a Nation John Connell, Charles Manning
1940s
1942 Lig van ‘n Eeu S. le Roux Marais, S. Richfield, Con Lamprecht Newels oor Mont-Aux-Sources Silent Ons Staan ‘n Dag Oor Silent Strange Princess Unknown
255
1944 Donker Spore Classical excerpts
1946 Die Skerpioen Library Die Wildsboudjie Library Geboortegrond Max Bruce Pinkie se Erfenis Library
1947 Die Pantoffelregering Unknown Dr. Kwak Library Simon Beyers Library
1949 African Jim The African Inkspots, the Jazz Maniacs Diamond City Clifton Parker Kom Saam, Vanaand Jan Pohl Oom Piet se Plaas Unknown Sarie Marais Library
1950s
1950 Hier’s Ons Weer Danie Bosman, Nico Carstens, Tienie Coetser, Hansie Gouws, Taffy Kikillus, S. le Roux Marais The Adventurers Cedric Thorpe Davie Zonk! Samuel Maile and The Zonk Band, Charles Berman [music director]
1951 Alles sal Regkom Library. [Hendrik Susan en Sy Orkes] Cry, the Beloved Country Raymond Gallois-Montbrun Daar Doer in die Bosveld Anton de Waal, Ernst van Rooyen 256
Song of Africa The African Inkspots, The Black Broadway Boys, D.R.C. Choir, Charles Berman [music director] The Magic Garden Matome “Tommy” Ramokgopa, Ralph Trewhela Where No Vultures Fly Alan Rawsthorne
1952 Altyd in my Drome Library [Hendrik Susan en Sy Orkes]
1953 Fifty/Vyftig Unknown Hans die Skipper Library Inspan Library
1954 Daar Doer in die Stad Library Die Leeu van Punda Maria Unknown Duel in the Jungle Mischa Spoliansky ‘n Plan is ‘n Boerdery Library [Anton de Waal, Nico Carstens, Taffy Kikillus, Die Petersen Broers, Die Proctor Mondfluitjie-Orkes] West of Zanzibar Alan Rawsthorne
1955 Geld Soos Bossies Nico Carstens, Anton de Waal Matieland Library Untamed Franz Waxman Vadertjie Langbeen Library Wanneer die Masker Val Joe Segal
1956 Paul Krüger Library
1957 Dis Lekker om te Lewe Library [Jan Pohl] 257
Donker Afrika [Taffy Kikillus]
1958 Die Bosvelder Unknown Die Goddelose Stad Les Keenan Die Sewende Horison Unknown Fratse in die Vloot Library [Taffy Kikillus] Nor the Moon by Night James Bernard
1959 Come Back, Africa Chatur Lal Die Wildeboere Unknown Ek Sal Opstaan S. le Roux Marais [theme song] Nooi Van My Hart Library, Jan Pohl, Die Petersen Broers, Die Grobbler Broers Piet se Tante Library [Jan Pohl] Satanskoraal Library The Desert Inn Unknown
1960s
1960 Die Bloedrooi Papawer Unknown Die Jagters Sam Sklair Die Vlugteling Library Hou die Blinkkant Bo Library [Taffy Kikillus] Kyk na die Sterre Unknown Last of the Few Stanley Glasser Oupa en die Plaasnooientjie Library [Jan Pohl] Rip van Wyk Richard Cherry
1961 As die Aarde Skeur [aka Tremor] George Esaul Basie Library 258
Boerboel de Wet Library Diamonds are Dangerous Unknown Die Bubbles Schroeder Storie Al Willox Die Hele Dorp Weet Unknown Doodkry is Min Unknown En die Vonke Spat Library Gevaarlike Reis Hugo Strasser Hands of Space Unknown Hans en die Rooinek Sam Sklair Moord in Kompartement 1001E Unknown Skadu van Gister Hennie van Loggerenberg Spore in die Modder Unknown The Fiercest Heart Irving Gertz The Hellions Larry Adler
1962 As Ons Twee Eers Getroud is Library Die Skelm van die Limpopo Unknown Die Tweede Slaapkamer Library Dilemma Gideon Nxumalo, Max Roach Geheim van Onderplaas Library Gevaarlike Spel Library [Taffy Kikillus] Jy’s Lieflik Vanaand George Esaul Lord Oom Piet Roy Martin Man in die Donker Jan Pohl Sammy Going South Tristram Cary, Les Baxter Stropers van die Laeveld Unknown Tom, Dirk en Herrie Library Voor Sononder Library
1963 Die Reën Kom Weer Unknown 259
Die Ruiter in die Nag Library Gee My Jou Hand Unknown Huis op Horings Jan Pohl Journey to Nowhere Edwin Astley, Ivor Slaney Kimberley Jim Bill Walker
1964 Code 7, Victim 5 [aka Table Bay] Johnny Douglas Death Drums along the River [aka Sanders] Sidney Torch Die Wonderwêreld van Kammie Kamfer Nico Carstens Dingaka Eddie Domingo, Bertha Egnos, Basil Gray, Stephen O’Reilly Piet my Niggie Library Rhino Lalo Schifrin Seven Against the Sun Roy Martin The Foster Gang Stephen O’Reilly Zulu John Barry
1965 Coast of Skeletons Christopher Whelen Debbie Chris Lamprecht, Manley van Niekerk Diamond Walkers Sam Sklair Die Voortreflike Familie Smit Unknown King Hendrik Sam Sklair Ride the High Wind [aka African Gold ] Bob Adams, Joe Kentridge Sands of the Kalahari John Dankworth Tokoloshe Sam Sklair
1966 Africa Shakes Bill Kimber and The Couriers, Brian Poole and The Tremeloes, The Settlers, Sharon Tandy, Dana Valery, Una Valli All the Way to Paris Sam Sklair Die Kavaliers Con Lamprecht 260
Mozambique Johnny Douglas Operation Yellow Viper Francesco de Masi The Naked Prey Edwin Astley, Andrew Tracey, Cornel Wilde The Second Sin Bob Adams, Joe Kentridge
1967 Bennie-Boet Unknown Die Jakkals van Tula Metsi Unknown Die Professor en die Prikkelpop Library [Four Jacks and a Jill] Escape Route Cape Town [aka The Cape Town Affair] Bob Adams, Joe Kentridge Hoor my Lied Con Lamprecht In die Lente van Ons Liefde Gus Cluver, Betsie Oosthuizen, Chicken Pienaar, Dolf van Niekerk, Riekie van Tonder Kruger Miljoene Con Lamprecht The Jackals Bob Adams, Joe Kentridge Wild Season Roy Martin
1968 Dark of the Sun Jacques Loussier Die Kandidaat Roy Martin Dr Kalie Sam Sklair Find Livingstone Unknown Jy is my Liefling Con Lamprecht King of Africa [aka One Step to Hell] Gianni Marchetti Majuba Bob Adams, Joe Kentridge One for the Pot Roy Martin Oupa for Sale Gerhard Trede Raka Graham Newcater The Long Red Shadow Michael du Preez Twee Broeders Ry Saam Unknown
261
1969 A Twist of Sand Tristram Cary Danie Bosman Danie Bosman Die Geheim van Nantes Con Lamprecht Die Vervlakste Tweeling Gerhard Trede Dirkie [aka Lost in the Desert] Gilbert Gibson, Art Heatley, William Loose, Sam Sklair Katrina Roy Martin Knock-Out Unknown Petticoat Safari Unknown Staal Burger Sam Sklair Stadig oor die Klippe Library [Nico Caarstens, Anton de Waal] Strangers at Sunrise Colin Campbell Vrolike Vrydag die 13de Dennis Wilman 262 Appendix D South African Film Industry Event Timeline, 1913-1969
Date Event 1913 I.W. Schlesinger enters film industry (Tomaselli 1988: 159). 1916 Public Control Ordinance (Cape Province) prohibits films ridiculing any section of the public (1988: 14). 1917 Cinematograph Film Ordinance (Cape) prohibits representation of antagonistic relations between employer and employee or black and white (1988: 14). 1931 Entertainment Act provides for censorship clearing before public screening and censors portrayal of racial mixing (14). 1934 Amendment to Entertainment Act prevents film societies screening “communist propaganda” (14). 1954 South African Society of Cinematographers formed (180). 1956 Motion Picture Producers Association (MPPA) formed with Jamie Uys as chair (32). Establishment of state subsidy scheme (29)—maximum reimbursement of R20 000 (33). Takeover of Schlesinger’s African Consolidated Films and African Consolidated Theatres by 20th Century Fox (159). 1957 Ster begins with Wonderboom Drive-In (160). 1962 Subsidy amended to production cost minus R22 500, with first R10 000 not taken into account (33). 1963 Publications and Entertainments Act introduces censorship of locally- produced material (14). Institution of the Publications Control Board (PCB) (14). 263
1964 Subsidy qualification threshold increased to R50 000 earned within four years of release. 44% of gross box office earnings above threshold paid to producer (33). 1968 Maximum subsidy payable is now unlimited (34). 1969 Subsidy on Afrikaans language films increased to 55% (35). SANLAM buys out 20th Century Fox, giving Afrikaner capital control of production, distribution and exhibition (35). Takeover of Fox by SANLAM (161). Suid-Afrikaanse Teaterbelange Beperk (Satbel) formed as holding company for Ster and Fox, the latter renamed Kinekor (162).